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MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY 




i Imtimrnl Jjarratittt 



WITH NUMEROUS 



ILLUSTRATIVE POETIC AND PROSE SELECTIONS 



A. POPULAR COURSE OF READING IN 

GRECIAN HISTORY AND LITERATURE 



-> 






MARCIUS WILLSON 

AND 

ROBERT PIERPONT WILLSON 




trfl 



NEW YORK 
HARPER k BROTHERS, FRANKLIN SQUARE 

1883 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1883, by 

HARPER & BROTHERS, 

In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at "Washington. 



All rights reserved 









PREFACE. 



The leading object had in view in the preparation of 
the present volume has been to produce, within a mod- 
erate compass, a History of Greece that shall not only 
be trustworthy, but interesting to all classes of readers. 

It must be acknowledged that our standard historical 
works, with all their worth, do not command a perusal 
by the people at large ; and it is equally plain that our 
ordinary School Manuals — the abridgments and out- 
lines of more voluminous works — do not meet with 
any greater favor. The mere outline system of histor- 
ical study usually pursued in the schools is interesting 
to those only to whom it is suggestive of the details 
on which it is based; and we have long been satis- 
fied that it is not the best for beginners and for pop- 
ular use; that it inverts the natural order of acquisi- 
tion; that for the young to master it is drudgery; that 
its statistical enumeration, if ever learned by them, 
is soon forgotten; that it tends to create a prejudice 
against the study of history; that it does not lay the 
proper foundation for future historical reading; and 
that, outside of the enforced study of the school-room, 
it is seldom made use of. The people in general— the 
masses — do not read such works, while they do read 



IV PREFACE. 

with avidity historical legends, historical romances, his- 
torical poems and dramas, and biographical sketches. 
And we do not hesitate to assert that from Shakspeare's 
historical plays the reading pnblic have acquired (to- 
gether with much other valuable information) a hun- 
dred-fold more knowledge of certain portions of English 
history than from all the ponderous tomes of formal his- 
tory that have ever been written. It may be said that 
people ought to read Hume, and Lingard, and Mackin- 
tosh, and Hallam, and Fronde, and Freeman, instead of 
Shakspeare's " King John," and " Richard II.," and 
"Henry IV.," and "Henry VEIL," etc. It is a suffi- 
cient reply to say they do not. 

Historical works, therefore, to be read by the masses, 
must be adapted to the popular taste. It was an ac- 
knowledgment of this truth that led Macaulay, the most 
brilliant of historians, to remark, " We are not certain 
that the best histories are not those in which a little 
of the exaggeration of fictitious narrative is judiciously 
employed. Something is lost in accuracy, but much is 
gained in effect. The fainter lines are neglected, but 
the great characteristic features are imprinted on the 
mind forever." If the result to which Macaulay refers 
be once attained by an introductory work so interesting 
that it shall come into general use, it will, we believe, nat- 
urally lead to the reading of some of the best standard 
works in the same historical field. In our attempt to 
make this a work of such a preparatory character, we 
have borne in mind the demand that has arisen for poetic 
illustration in the reading and teaching of history, and 
have given this delightful aid to historical study a prom- 
inent place — ofttimes making it the sole means of im- 
parting information. And yet we have introduced notli- 



' PREFACE. V 

ing that is not strictly consistent with our ideal of what 
history should be ; for although some of the poetic se- 
lections are avowedly wholly legendary, and others, still, 
in a greater or less degree fictitious in their minor de- 
tails — like the by-plays in Shakspeare's historic dramas 
— we believe they do no violence to historical verity, as 
they are faithful pictures of the times, scenes, incidents, 
principles, and beliefs which they are employed to illus- 
trate. Aside, too, from their historic interest, they have 
a literary value. Many prose selections from the best 
historians are also introduced, giving to the narrative a 
pleasing variety of style that can be found in no one 
writer, even if he be a Grote, a Gibbon, or a Macaulay. 



THE PRINCIPAL HISTORIES OF GREECE. 

Believing that it may be of some advantage to the 
general reader, we give herewith a brief sketch of the 
principal histories of Greece now before the public. We 
may mention, among those of a comprehensive charac- 
ter, the works of Goldsmith, Gillies, Mitford, Thirlwall, 
Grote, and Curtius : 

Oliver Goldsmith, "the popular poet, the charming 
novelist, the successful dramatist, and the witty essayist," 
wrote a popular history of Greece, in two volumes, 8vo, 
1774, embracing a period from the earliest date down to 
the death of Alexander the Great. It is an attractive 
work, elegantly written, but is superficial and inaccurate. 

In 1786 was published a history of ancient Greece, in 
several volumes, by Dr. John Gillies, who succeeded 
Dr. Robertson as historiographer of Scotland. This is a 
work of considerable merit, but it is written in a spirit 
of decidedly monarchical tendencies, although the author 
evidently aimed at great fairness in his political views. 



VI PKEFACE. 

He says : " The history of Greece exposes the dangerous 
turbulence of democracy, and arraigns the despotism of 
tyrants. By describing the incurable evils inherent in 
every republican policy, it evinces the inestimable bene- 
fits resulting to liberty itself from the lawful dominion of 
hereditary kings, and the steady operation of well-regu- 
lated monarchy." 

In the year 1784 appeared the first volume of William 
Mitford's History of Greece, subsequently extended to 
eight and ten volumes, 8vo. It is the first history of 
Greece that combines extensive research and profound 
philosophical reflection ; but it is " a monarchical " histo- 
ry, by a writer of very strong anti-republican principles. 
" It was composed," says Alison, the distinguished histo- 
rian of modern Europe, "during, or shortly after, the 
French Revolution ; and it was mainly intended to coun- 
teract the visionary ideas in regard to the blessings of 
Grecian democracy, which had spread so far in the world, 
from- the magic of Athenian genius." Says Chancellor 
Kent : " Mitf ord does not scruple to tell the truth, and 
the whole truth, and to paint the stormy democracies of 
Greece in all their grandeur and in all their wretched- 
ness." Lord Byron said of the author : " His great pleas- 
ure consists in praising tyrants, abusing Plutarch, spelling 
oddly, and writing quaintly; and — what is strange, after 
all — his is the best modern history of Greece in any lan- 
guage." But this was penned before Thirl wall's and 
Grote's histories were published. Lord Macaulay says of 
Mitf ord: "Whenever this historian mentions Demosthenes 
he violates all the laws of candor and even of decency : 
he weighs no authorities, he makes no allowances, he for- 
gets the best authenticated facts in the history of the 
times, and the most generally recognized principles of hu- 
man nature." The North British JReview, after calling 
Mitf ord " a bad scholar, a bad historian, and a bad writer 
of English," says, farther, that " he was the first writer of 
any note who found out that Grecian history was a living 
thing with a practical bearing." 



PREFACE. vii 

The next truly important and comprehensive Grecian 
history, published from 1835 to 1840, in eight volumes, 
8vo, was written by Conxop Thirlwall, D.D., Bishop of 
St. David's. It is a scholarly, elaborate, and philosophical 
work, evincing a thorough knowledge of Greek literature 
and of the German commentators. The historian Grote 
said that, if it had appeared a few years earlier, he should 
probably never have undertaken his own history of Greece. 
"I should certainly," he says, "not have been prompted 
to the task by any deficiencies such as those I felt and 
regretted in Mitford." 

In comparing ThirlwalPs history with Grote' s, the North 
British Hevieio has the following judicious remarks : 
" Many persons, probably, who have no special devotion 
to Grecian history wish to study its main outlines in some- 
thing higher than a mere school-book. To such readers 
we should certainly recommend Thirlwall rather than 
Grote. The comparative brevity, the greater clearness 
and terseness of the narrative, the freedom from diver- 
sions and digressions, all render it far better suited for 
such a purpose. But for the political thinker, who re- 
gards Grecian history chiefly in its practical bearing, Mr. 
Grote's work is far better adapted. The one is the work 
of a scholar, an enlarged and practical scholar indeed, but 
still one in whom the character of the scholar is the pri- 
mary one. The other is the work of a politician and man 
of business, a London banker, a Radical M.P., whose de- 
votion to ancient history and literature forms the most 
illustrious confutation of the charges brought against such 
studies as being useless and impractical." 

" The style of Thirlwall," says Dr. Samuel Warren, of 
England, in his Introduction to Law Studies, "is dry, terse, 
and exact — not fitted, perhaps, for the historical tyro, but 
most acceptable to the advanced student who is in quest 
of things." 

George Grote, Member of Parliament, and a London 
banker, who wrote a history of Greece in twelve volumes, 
published from 1846 to 1855, has been styled, by way of 



Vlll PEEFACE. 

eminence, the historian of Greece, because his work is 
universally admitted by critics to be the best for the ad- 
vanced student that has yet been written. The London 
Athenaeum styles his history "a great literary undertak- 
ing, equally notable whether we regard it as an accession 
of standard value in our language, or as an honorable 
monument of what English scholarship can do." The 
London Quarterly Review says : " Errors the most invet- 
erate, that have been handed down without misgiving 
from generation to generation, have been for the first 
time corrected by Mr. Grote ; facts the most familiar 
have been presented in new aspects and relations; things 
dimly seen, and only partially apprehended previously, 
have now assumed their true proportions and real sig- 
nificance ; while numerous traits of Grecian character, 
and new veins of Grecian thought and feeling, have been 
revealed to the eyes of scholars by Mr. Grote's search- 
ing criticism, like new forms of animated nature by the 
microscope." 

The general character of the work has been farther well 
summed up by Sir Archibald Alison. He says : "A de- 
cided liberal, perhaps even a republican, in politics, Mr. 
Grote has labored to counteract the influence of Mitford 
in Grecian history, and construct a history of Greece from 
authentic materials, which should illustrate the animating 
influence of democratic freedom upon the exertions of the 
human mind. In the prosecution of this attempt he has 
displayed an extent of learning, a variety of research, a 
power of combination, which are worthy of the very high- 
est praise, and have secured for him a lasting place among 
the historians of modern Europe." 

We may also mention, in this connection, the valuable 
and scholarly work of the German professor, Ernst Cur- 
tius (1857-'67), in five volumes, translated by A.Ward 
(1 871-74). His sympathies are monarchical, and his views 
more nearly accord with those of Mitford and Thirlwall 
than with those of Grote. 

The work by William Smith, in one volume, 1865, is an 



PREFACE. IX 

excellent summary of Grecian history, as is also that of 
George W. Cox, 1876. The former work, which to a con- 
siderable extent is an abridgment of Grote, has been 
brought down, in a Boston edition, from the Roman Con- 
quest to the middle of the present century, by Dr. Felton, 
late President of Harvard College. President Felton has 
also published two volumes of scholarly lectures on An- 
cient and Modern Greece (1867). 

The works devoted to limited periods of Grecian his- 
tory and special departments of research are very numer- 
ous. Among the most valuable of the former is the His- 
tory of the Peloponnesian War, by the Greek historian 
Thucydides, of which there are several English versions. 
He was born in Athens, about the year 471 b.c. His is 
one of the ablest histories ever written. 1 

Herodotus, the earliest and best of the romantic his- 
torians, sometimes called the "Father of History," was 
contemporary with Thucydides. He wrote, in a charming 
style, an elaborate work on the Persian and Grecian wars, 
most of the scenes of which he visited in person ; and 
in numerous episodes and digressions he interweaves the 
most valuable history that we have of the early Asiatic 
nations and the Egyptians ; but he indulges too much in 
the marvellous to be altogether reliable. 2 

Of the numerous works of Xenophon, an Athenian, 
who is sometimes called the "Attic Muse," from the 
simplicity and beauty of his style, the best known and 
the most pleasing are the Anab'asis, the Memorabil'ia of 
Socrates, and the Cyropedi'a, a political romance. 3 He 
was born about 443 b.c. The best English translation of 
his works is by Watson, in Harper's "New Classical 
Library." 

The work of the Greek historian, Polybius, originally in 
forty volumes, of which only five remain entire, covered a 
period from the downfall of the Macedonian power to the 
subversion of Grecian liberty by the Romans, 146 b.c. It 

\ See, farther, p. 341. 2 g ee> farther, p. 337. s g ee p . 454, 

1" 



X PREFACE. 

is a work of great accuracy, but of little rhetorical polish, 
and embraces much of Roman history from which Livy 
derived most of the materials for his account of the wars 
with Carthage. 

In the first century of our era, Plutarch, a Greek biog- 
rapher, wrote the "Parallel Lives" of forty-six distin- 
guished Greeks and Romans — a charming and instructive 
work, translated by John and William Langhorne in 1771, 
and by Arthur Hugh Clough in 1858. 

A history of Greece, in seven volumes, by George Fin- 
lay, a British historian, long resident at Athens, is noted 
for a thorough knowledge of Greek topography, art, and 
antiquity. The completed work embraces a period from 
the conquest of Greece by the Romans to the middle of 
the present century. 

A History of Greek Literature, by J. P. Mahaffy, is the 
most polished descriptive work in the department which 
it embraces. It is happily supplemented b,y J. Addington 
Symonds' Studies of the Greek Poets. Mr. Mahaffy, in 
common with many German scholars, is an unbeliever 
in the unity of the Iliad} 



1 See p. 135. 



CONTENTS. 



[The names of authors from whom illustrative prose selections are taken are in 
small capitals j those from whom poetic selections are taken are in italics.] 



CHAPTER I. 

GENERAL VIEW OP THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 

Introductory.— Olympus — Hemans.— Pi'e-rus.— Pope Pa^e l 2 

1. Thessaly.— Tem'pe.— Hemans g 2 3 

2. Epi'rus.— Cocy'tus, Ach'eron, Dodo'na— Milton: Haygarth: Byron.... 3,4 

3. Acarna'nia.— 4. -SGto'lia — 5. to'cris.— 6. Doris 5 

7. Pho'cis.— Parnassus — Byron.— Delphi.— Hemans 7 

8. Boeo'tia.— Thebes.— Schiller 7 

9. Attica.— Byron.— 1 0. Corinth.— Byron : Haygarth 9_H 

11. Acha'ia.— 12. Arcadia — 13. Ar'golis Myce'nEe— Hemans 12,13 

14. Laco'nia.— 15. Messe'nia.— 16. E'lis 13 14 

1 7. The Isles of Greece.— Byron 14 

Lemnos. — Eubce'a. — Cyc'la-des. — De'los. — Spoi 'a-des. — Crete — 
Rhodes— Sal'amis.— ^Egi'na.— Cyth'-era.— " Veuus Rising from the 
Sea." — Woolnei 15 16 

Stroph'a-des— Virgil. — Paxos.— Zacyn'thus.— Cephalo'ni'a.— Ith'a'ca. ' 
— Leu'cas or Leuca'dia. — Corcy'ra or Cor'fu. — "Gardens of Al- 
cin '°- us '" 17,13 

CHAPTER II. 

THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD OP GRECIAN HISTORY. 

I. Grecian Mythology 19C9 

Value of the Grecian Fables — J. Stuart Blackie 2 

The Battle of the Giants.— He'siod " ' 21 

nymn to Jupiter.— Clean'thes 9q 

The god Apollo.— Ov'id .........'."'.'. 2 5 

Fancies of the Greek Mind— Wordsworth : Liddell': Blackie 2T-29 

The Poet's Lament— Schiller " " „-. 

The Creation.— Ovid '..'...'. 30 

The Origin of Evil.—Hesiod .............".".""*".",' 37 39 

What Prome'theus Personified.— Blackie '..'.'.'.'..'..'.!'.'.". '43 

The Punishment of Prometheus.— JEs'chylus : Shelley'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'..'.'.'. .'45 47 



xii CONTENTS. 

Grecian Mythology— Continued. 

Deluge of Deuca'lion.— Ovid Page 4S 

Moral Characteristics of the Gods, etc.— Mahaffy : Gladstone: Ho- 
mer : JEschylus : Hesiod 52-56 

Oaths. — Homer : jEschylus : Soph' odes : Virgil 59, 60 

The Future State.— Homer 60 

1. Story of Tan'talns.— Blackie 62 

2. The Descent of Or'pheus.— Ovid : Homer 63, 64 

3. The Elys'ium.— Homer : Pindar 64, 65 

Hindoo and T3reek Scepticism.— (Cornhill Magazine) 66 

II. The Earliest Inhabitants of Greece 70-76 

The Founding of Athens.— Blackie 71 

III. The Heroic Age 76-115 

Heroic Times foretold to Adam.— Milton 76 - 

Twelve Labors of Hercules.— Homer 77 

Fable of Hercules and An tse'us.— Collins 79 

The Argonautic Expedition.— Pindar SI, 82 

Legend of Hy'las.— Bayard Taylor 83 

The Trojan War S6 

1. The Greek Armament.— Eurip'ides 86 

2. The name Helen.— ^Eschylus 87 

3. Ulysses and Thersi'tes.— Homer. (Pope), 88 

4. Combat of Menela'us and Paris.— Homer. (Pope) 90 

5. Parting of Hector and Androm'a-che.— Homer. (Pope) 90 

6. Hector's Exploits and Death of Patro'clus.— Homer. (Pope) 94 

7. The Shield of Achilles. —Homer. (Sotheby) 96 

8. Address of Achilles to his Horses— Homer. (Pope) 99 

9. The Death of Hector.— II omer. (Bryant) 99 

10. Priam Begging for Hector's Body.— Homer. (Cowper) 101 

11. Lamentations of Andromache and Helen.— Homer. (Pope).. 102, 103 

The Fate of Troy.— Virgil : Schiller 104, 107 

Beacon Fires from Troy to Argos.—^Eschyhts 10S 

Eemarks on the Trojan War.— Thielavall : Grote 110 

Fate of the Actors in the Conflict — Ennius : Landor : Lang 111-114 

IV. Arts and Civilization in the Heroic Age 116-125 

Political Life of the Greeks.— Mahaffy : Heeuen 116, US 

Domestic Life and Character.— Mauaffy : Homer 120, 121 

The Kaft of Ulysses.— Homer 123 

V. The Conquest of Peloponnesns, and Colonies in Asia 

Minor , 126-129 

Return of the Heracli'dse — Lucan 127, 12S 



CHAPTER III. 

EARLY GREEK LITERATURE, AND GREEK COMMUNITY OF 

INTERESTS. 

Ionian Language and Culture.— Felton 130, 131 

I. Homer and his Poems.— Antip'ater : Felto* : Taefouiid : Pope: 

COLKUIDGE 134-141 

II. Some Causes of Greek Unity 142-152 

The Grecian Festivals 144 

1. Chariot Race and Death of Oves'tes— Sophocles 146 

2. Apollo's Conflict with the Python.— Ovid 14S 

3. The Apollo Belvedere.— Thomson 149 

The National Councils 150 



CONTENTS. xiil 

CHAPTER IV. 

SPARTA, AND THE LEGISLATION OP LYCURGUS. 
Description of Sparta.— Thomson p a «. e 153 

r. Tlie Constitution of Lycurgus 154-15G 

Spartan Patriotic Virtue.— Tymnce'us . 150 

II. Spartan Poetry and Music 157 153 

Spartan March.— Campbell : Remans "".'.'.......' 157 

Songs of the Spartans.- Plutaecu : Terparider: Pindar : Ion 158, 159 

III. Sparta's Conquests 150-161 

War-song.— Tyrtce'us ..'.'.'.'...'.'.'.'.'.'.'.'.., \ igo 



CHAPTER V. 

FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, AND CHANGES IN GRECIAN POLITICS. 

Introductory.— Tuielwall : Leg'ae£ 102 163 

I. Changes from Aristocracies to Oligarchies.— Heeben 163-165 

II. Changes from Oligarchies to Despotisms.— Thiblwall : Hek- 

eicn : Bulwee : Theog'nis 165-168 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE EARLY HISTORY OF ATHENS. 

I. The legislation of Dra'co 1T0 

II. The Legislation of So'lon— Plxjtaecu: A'kenside: Solon: Thomson- 

Solon 171-1T6 

III. The Usurpation of Pisis'tratus 176-1S0 

The Usurper and his Stratagem.— A kenside 177 

Salon's Appeal to the Athenians.— Akenside ' 17s 

Character of Pisistratus.— Tiiiklwalt ' 17s 

Conspiracy of Harraodius and Aristogi'ton Callis' train's. '. .' '. '. '. '. ] '. . .' .' .' 179 

IV. Birth of Democracy.— Tiiielwall 1S0 



CHAPTER VII. 

A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREEK COLONIES. 

The Cave of the Cumae'an Sibyl.— Virgil : Geote 133 

The'ron, of Agrigen'tum.— Pindar 184 

Increase among the Sicilian Greeks.— Geote iss 



CHAPTER VIII. 

PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 

I. The Poems of Hesiod.-" Winter. "-Felton: Mdee: Tihrlwall- 

Maiiaffy • 1S8-192 



Xiv CONTENTS. 

II. tyric Poetry Page 192-202 

Calli'nus, of Ephesus.— " War Elegy " 193 

Archil'ochus of Pa'ros— Symonds : Mauaffy 194 

Alc'man.— " Sleep, or Night."— Mure 196 

Ari'on.— Stesich'orus.— Mahaffy 196 

Alcams.— " Spoils of War."— Akemide 197, 198 

Sappho.—" Defence of."— Symonps : Antip'ater 199 

Anac'reon — " The Grasshopper."— A kenside 201 

III. Early Grecian Philosophy • • • • .202-210 

The Seven Sages.— (Maxims).— Geote 203, 204 

Tha'les, Anaxini'enes, Heracli'tus, Diog'enes, Auaximan'der, and Xen- 

oph'anes • 204 

Pythagoras and his Doctrines. — Blackie : Thomson: Coleridge: 

Lowell 205-207 

The Eleusin'ian Mysteries.— Virgil 20S, 209 

IV. Architecture 211-215 

The Cyclo'pean Walls.— Lord Houghton 211 

Dor'ic, Ion'ic, and Corinthian Orders.— Thomson 212 

Cher'siphron, and the Temple of Diana.— Story 212, 213 

Temples at Paes'tum.— Cranch 215 

V. Sculpture 216-213 

Glaucus, Khce'cus, Theodo'rus, Dipce'nus, Scyllis 216 

Cause of the Progress of Sculpture.— Thielwall 217 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE PERSIAN WARS. 

I. The Ionic Revolt 219-221 

II. The First Persian War 221-232 

The Battle of Marathon 222 

Legends of the Battle.— Eemans : Blackie 223, 224 

The Death of Milti'ades : his Character.— Geote : Gilxies 229, 230 

Aristi'des and Themis' tocles.— Thomson : Plutaech: Tmi<LWAxx.231, 232 

III. The Second Persian Invasion 233-259 

Xerxes at Aby'dos.— IIeeod'otcs 233 

Bridging of the Hellespont.— Juvenal : Milton 235 

The Battle of Thermopylae 236 

1. Invincibility of the Spartans.— Haygarth 236 

2. Description of the Contest — Haygarth 23S 

3. Epitaphs on those who fell.— Simon' ides 239 

4. The Tomb of Leon'idas.— Anon 241 

5. Eulogy on the Fallen.— Byron 241 

Naval Conflict at Artemis'ium— Plutaeou : Pindar 242 

The Abandonment of Athens 242 

The Battle of Salamis 243 

1. Xerxes Views the Conflict.— Byron 244 

2. Flight of Xerxes Juvenal : Alamanni 244 

3. Celebrated Description of the Battle.— Mitfoed: JEschylus 245 

4. Another Account.— Blackie 250 

The Battle of Platse'a 253 

1. Description of the Battle.— Bulwee 254 

2. Importance of the Victory.— Southey : Bulwee 257 

3. Victory at Myc'a-le.— Buxweb 253 

4. " The Wasps."— Aristophanes 259 



CONTENTS. XV 

CHAPTER X. 

THE EISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 

I. The Disgrace and Death of Themistocles Page 260-262 

Tributes to his Memory.— Plato : Gemimis: Thielwall 261, 262 

II. The Rise and Fall of Cimon 262-267 

Character of Cimon — Thomson im 2G2 

Battle of Eurym'edon. — Simonides 263 

Earthquake at Sparta, and Revolt of the Helots.— Bulwee : Alison. 265, 267 

III. The Accession of Pericles to Power 267-273 

Changes in the Athenian Constitution.— Bulwee 268 

Tribute to Pericles.— Croly , 271 

Picture of Athens in Peace; — Haygarth 272 



CHAPTER XI. 

THE PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND THE FALL OF ATHENS. 

Speech of Pericles for War.— Thucyd'ides 275 

I. The First Peloponnesian War 276-2S5 

Funeral Oration of Pericles.— Tuucydibes 277 

Comments on the Oration.— Cuetius 281 

The Plague at Athens.— Lucretius m 282 

Death of Pericles.— Croly : Thielwall : Bulwee 283 2S4 

Character of Pericles. — Mitfobd 285 

II. The Athenian Demagogues 286-290 

Cleon, the Demagogue.— Gillies : Aeistoph'anes ."..'".287 2S8 

The Peace of Ni'cias _ '290 

III. The Sicilian Expedition 291-292 

Treatment of the Athenian Prisoners.— Byron 292 

IV. The Second Peloponnesian War 292-297 

Humiliation of Athens . 294 

Barbarities of the Contest.— Mahafft . . . . [ ..... 296 



CHAPTER XII, 

GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART, FROM THE BEGINNING OF THE 
PERSIAN TO THE CLOSE OF THE PELOPONNESIAN WARS (B.C. 
500-403). 

LITERATURE. 

Introductory. 

The Era of Athenian Greatness.— Symonds 298 

I. Lyric Poetry 299-306 

Simonides.—" Lamentation of Dan'a-e."— Mauaffy .""." .299 301 

Pindar. — "Threnos." — Thielwall: Prior: Symonds: Gray : Pope: 

Horace 302-306 

H. The Drama.— Bulwee 307-308 

1. Tragedy.— Melpom'ene — Akenside SOS-S^ 

^Eschylus. — "Death of Agamemnon." — Plumptee:' La weenoe: 

Vox Schlegel : Byron : Maiiaffy 309-313 

Sophocles. - " ffid'ipus Tyran'nus." - Talfoued • ' Phryn'ichus :~ 
Simmias 314 _ 321 



xvi CONTENTS. 

The Drama- Continued. 

Euripides— "Alcestis Preparing for Death." — Symonps: Milton: 

Mahaffy Page 321-325 

The Transitions of Tragedy.— Grote 325 

2. Comedy 326-336 

Characterization of 327 

Aristophanes.— Extracts from "The Clouds." "Choral Song from 
The Birds."— Plato : Grote: Sewell: Milton: Ruskin 329-335 

III. History 336-344 

Hecatse'us.— Mahaffy : Niebtjhr 336, 337 

Herodotus. — "Introduction to History." — La whence 337-338 

Herodotus and his Writings. — Maoaulay 339 

Thucyd'i-des.— Mahaffy 341, 342 

Thucydides and Herodotus.— Browne 343 

IV. Philosophy 344-359 

Aiiaxag'oras : his Death. — William Canton 344, 345 

The Sophists.— Mahaffy 349, 350 

Socrates. — "Defence of Socrates."— "Socrates' Views of a Future 
State." — Mahaffy : Thomson : Smith : Tyler : Grote 351-359 

ART. 

I. Sculpture and Painting 360-366 

Phid'ias. — Lubkk : Gilt.ies : Lubke 360-363 

Polygno'tus.— Apollodo'rus.— Zeux'is.— Parrha'sius.— Timan'thes.. 363-364 
Parrhasius and his Captive.— Seneca: Willis 364, 365 

II. Architecture 367-374 

Introductory.— Thomson 367 

The Adornment of Athens.— Bulwer 368 

I. The Acrop'olis and its Splendors 369 

The Parthenon. — Ilemans 370 

II. Other Architectural Monuments of Athens 372 

The Temple of The' sens.— Hay garth 373 

Athenian Enthusiasm for Art.— Bulwer 373 

The Glory of Athens.— Tal/ourd 374 



CHAPTER XIII. 

TnE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES. 

I. The Expedition of Cyrus, and the Retreat of the Ten Thou- 
sand. — Thomson : Curtius 375-377 

II. The Supremacy of Sparta ■' 37S-3S1 

III. The Rise and Fall of Thebes 381-383 

Pelop'idas and Epaminon'das.— Thomson : Curtius 3S2 



CHAPTER XIV. 

THE SICILIAN GREEKS. 

The Founding of iEtna. —Pindar 3S4 

Hi'ero's Victory at Cu'mse — Pindar 3S5 

Admonitions to Hiero.— Pindar 3S5 

Dionysius the Elder.— Plutarch 3S6, 3S7 

Damon and Pythias.— The Hostage.—- Schiller 3SS 

Archime'des — Schiller 39 ^ 

Visit of Cicero to the Grave of Archimedes — Winturop 393 



CONTENTS. xvii 

CHAPTER XY. 

THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 



I. The Sacred War.— Thieiayall p a 



ge 307, 398 



II. Sketch of Macedonia 

III. Interference of Philip of Macedon 399-405 

Demosthenes.— " The First Philippic."— Geote .400-403 

Pho'cion — His Influence at Athens.— Grote ' 404 

IV. War with Macedon 405-408 

V. Accession of Alexander the Great.... 40 s 

VI. Alexander Invades Asia 409 

VII. The Battle of Arbe'la. — Flight and Death of Darius. - 

Geote : ^Es'oiiines 410-412 

Alexander's Feast at Persep'olis.— Dryden . '. ". '. '. . .' ' . .' .' ..........'.'... 413 

VIII. The Death of Alexander \\\\\ 416 

His Career and his Character.— Lu'can !."."!!!.".*." 417 

Reflections on his Life, etc.— Juvenal : Byron ........ '. [ .' .' .' ...'" 413 419 



CHAPTER XVI. 

FROM THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER TO THE CONQUEST OF GREECE 

BY THE ROMANS. 

I. A Retrospective Glance at Greece 420-433 

Oration of ^Eschines against Ctes'iphon '" ' 42l 

Oration of Demosthenes on the Crown *.'..' . . . "...*"... 497 

II. The Wars that followed Alexander's Death .... 434.437 

Character of Ptolemy Philadelphus-TOeoc'^^s ....!.".'!... 436 

III. The Celtic Invasion, and the War with Pyrrhus... . 437-441 

Queen Archadami'a Anon ' ^39 

IV. The Achaean League.— Philip V. of Macedon 442-444 

Epigrams on Philip and the Macedonians.— A lece'us 444 

V. Greece Conquered by Home 444.447 

" The Liberty of Greece."— Wordsworth ^Jl 

Desolation of Corinth.— Antipater. ... 7Z 

Last Struggles of Greece. -Thieiayall : Horace. '..'.'. 446 



CHAPTER XVII. 

LITERATURE AND ART AFTER THE CLOSE OF THE PELOPONNESIAN 

WAR. 

LITERATURE. 

I. The Drama.— Mahaffy 440,1*1 

Phile'mon.-" Faith in God.".... ...'.".. Tm 

Menander.-" Human Existence. "-SymokmV Laweekce'. '. '. 449^51 

II. Oratory — Milton: Cicebo 4Ki-4Kr 

ASs'chines and Demosthenes.-LEGAEE : BeoughamV Hume." \ '. .'." .' ."S^G 
HI. Philosophy 

Flato.-Haygarth : Beot/gham" ': KendeickV Mitchell! '.'.'. 45?^ 

Aristotle. -Pope: Beowne: Laayeence: Smith: Mahaffy 459^401 

Academe.— A mold 4*9 

Epicu'rus and Zc'no.— Lucretius ... f™ 

4oo 



XV111 CONTENTS. 

IV. History r Page 404-467 

Xen'ophou.— Mitchell 4C5 

Polyb'ius 466 

AET. 

I. Architecture and Sculpture 468-472 

Changes in Statuary — Weyman -. 468 

The Dying Gladiator.— LUbke : Thomson 470, 471 

The La-oc'o-on. — Thomson : Holland 471, 472 

II. Painting 472-474 

Venus Rising from the Sea.— Antipater 473 

Apel'les and Protog'enes.— Anthon 473 

Protogenes' Picture at Khodes.— Thomson 474 

Concluding Reflections. 

The Image of Athens.— Shelley '. 475 

Immortal Influence of Athens.— Maoaulay : Haygarth 476-478 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 

I. Greece under the Romans 479-491 

The Revolt.— Finlay. 479 

Christianity in Greece. — Felton 480 

II. Changes down to the Fourteenth Century ..4S2-4S5 

Courts of the Crusading Chieftains.— Edinburgh Review 4S3 

The Duchy of Athens.— Felton 483 

The Turkish Invasion.— Hemans 484 

III. Contests between the Turks and Venetians 4S6-494 

Past and Present of the Acropolis of Athens 486 

The Siege and Fall of Corinth.— Byron 4S8 

IV. Final Conquest of Greece by Turkey 493-500 

Turkish Oppressions.— Tennent 493 

The Slavery of Greece.— Canning : Byron 494, 495 

First Steps to Secure Liberty.— The Klephts.— Felton 497 

Greek War-Songs.— Rhigas : Polyzois 499, 500 

V. The Greek Revolution 500-52.4 

A Prophetic Vision of the Struggle.— Shelley's " Hellas " 502 

Song of the Greeks.— Campbell 509 

American Sympathy with Greece.— Tuokerman : Webster 511 

The Sortie at Missolon'ghi.— Warburton 514 

A Visit to Missolonghi — Stephens 516 

Marco Bozzar'is — HallecJc 517 

Battle of Navari'no.— Campbell 523 

VI. Greece under a Constitutional Monarchy 525-532 

Revolution against King Otho.— Benjamin 526 

The Deposition of King Otho: Greece under his Rule.— Tuokerman : 

British Quarterly 527 

Accession of King George.— His Government.— Tuokerman 529 

Progress in Modern Greece.— Cook 531 

INDEX 533 



MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTEE I. 

GENERAL VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND 

ISLANDS. 

The country called Hellas by the IMle'nes, its native 
inhabitants, and known tons by the name of Greece 
forms the southern part of the most easterly of the three 
great peninsulas of Southern Europe, extending into the 
Mediterranean between the, JEge'an Sea, or Grecian 
Archipelago, on the east, and the Ionian Sea on the west. 
The whole area of this country, so renowned in history, 
is only about twenty thousand square miles; which is 
considerably less than that of Portugal, and less than 
half that of the State of Pennsylvania. 

■ The mainland of ancient Greece was naturally divided 
into Northern Greece, which embraced Thessaly and 
Epi'rus; Central Greece, comprising the divisions of 
Acarna'nia, Mo'lin, Lo'eris, Do'ris, Pho'cis, Bceo'tia, and 
At'tica (the latter forming the eastern extremity of the 
whole peninsula); and Southern Greece, which the an- 
cients called Pel-o-jJon-ne'sus, or the Island of Pe'lops, 
which would be an island were it not for the narrow 
Isthmus of Corinth, which connects it on the north with 
Central Greece. Its modern name, the Mo-re' a, was be- 
stowed upon it from its resemblance to the leaf of the 

1 



2 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

mulberry. The chief political divisions of Peloponnesus 
were Corinth and Acha'ia on the north, Ar'golis on 
the east, Laco'nia and Messe'nia at the southern extrem- 
ity of the peninsula, ETis on the west, and the central 
region of Arca'dia. 

Greece proper is separated from Macedonia on the 
north by the Ceraunian and Cambunian chain of moun- 
tains, extending in irregular outline from the Ionian Sea 
on the west to the Therma'ic Gulf on the east, terminat- 
ing, on the eastern coast, in the lofty summit of Mount 
Olympus, the fabled residence of the gods, where, in the 
early dawn of history, Jupiter (called "the father of 
gods and men") was said to hold his court, and where he 
reigned supreme over heaven and earth. Olympus rises 
abruptly, in colossal magnificence, to a height of more 
than six thousand feet, lifting its snowy head far above 
the belt of clouds that nearly always hangs upon the 
sides of the mountain. 

Wild and august in consecrated pride, 

There through the deep-blue heaven Otympus towers, 

Girdled with mists, light-floating as to hide 

The rock-built palace of immortal powers. Hemans. 

In the Olympian range, also, was Mount Pie'rus, where 
was the Pierian fountain, one of the sacred resorts of 
the Muses, so often mentioned by the poets, and to 
which Pope, with gentle sarcasm, refers when he says, 

A little learning is a dangerous thing : 
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring. 

1. Thessaly. — From the northern chain of mountains, 
the central Pindus range, running south, separates Thes- 
saly on the east from Epi'rus on the west. The former 
region, enclosed by mountain ranges broken only on the 
east, and watered by the Pene'us and its numerous trib- 



VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 3 

utaries, embraced the largest and most fertile plain in 
all Greece. On the Thessalian coast, south of Olympus, 
were the celebrated mounts Ossa and Pe'lion, which the 
giants, in their wars against the gods, as the poets fable, 
piled upon Olympus in their daring attempt to scale the 
heavens and dethrone the gods. Between these mounts 
lay the celebrated vale of Tem'pe, through which the 
Pene'us flowed to the sea. 

Romantic Tempe ! thou art yet the same — 
Wild as when sung by bards of elder time : 
Years, that Lave changed thy river's classic name, 1 
Have left thee still in savage pomp sublime. Hemaxs. 

Farther south, having the sea on one side and the lofty . 
cliffs of Mount CE'ta on the other, was the celebrated 
narrow pass of Thermopylae, leading from Thessaly into 
Central Greece. 

2. Epi'rus. — The country of Epirus, on the west of 
Thessaly, was mostly a wild and mountainous region, but 
with fertile intervening valleys. Among the localities 
of Epirus celebrated in fable and in song was the river 
Cocy'tus, which the poets, on account of its nauseous L 
waters, described as one of the rivers of the lower 
world — 

Cocytus, named of lamentation loud 

Heard on the rueful stream. 

The Ach'eroii was another of the rivers — 

Sad Acheron of sorrow, black and deep — 

Milton. 

which was assigned by the poets to the lower world, 
and over which the souls of the dead were said to be 
first conveyed, before they were borne to the Le'the, or 



1 The modern name of the Pene'us is Selembria or Salamvria. 



4 MOSAICS' OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

"stream of oblivion," beyond. The true Acheron of 
Epirus has been thus described : 

Yonder rolls Acheron his dismal stream, 
Sunk in a narrow bed : cypress and fir 
Wave their dim foliage on his rugged banks ; 
And underneath their boughs the parched ground, 
Strewed o'er with juniper and withered leaves, 
Seems blasted by no mortal tread. 

As the Acheron falls into the lake Acheru'sia, and 
after rising from it flows underground for some dis- 
tance, this lake also has been connected by the poets 
with the gloomy legend of its fountain stream. 

This is the place 
Sung bv the ancient masters of the lyre, 
"Where disembodied spirits, ere they left 
Their earthly mansions, lingered for a time 
Upon the confines of eternal night, 
Mourninsr their doom : and oft the astonished hind, 
As home he journeyed at the fall of eve, 
Viewed unknown forms flitting across his path, 
And in the breeze that waved the sighing boughs 
Heard shrieks of woe. Haygartii. 

In Epirus w T as also situated the celebrated city of 

J Dodo'na, with the temple of that name, where was the 

most ancient oracle in Greece, whose fame extended even 

to Asia. But in the wide waste of centuries even the 

site of this once famous oracle is forgotten. 

Where, now, Dodona ! is thine aged grove, 

Prophetic fount, and oracle divine ? 

What valley echoes the response of Jove ? 

What trace remaineth of the Thunderer's shrine? 

All, all forgotten ! 

Byron. 



VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 5 

3. Acarna'nia. — Coming now to Central Greece, lying 
northward of the Corinthian Gulf, we find Acarnania 
on the far west, for the most part a productive country 
with good harbors : but the Acarnanians, a rude and 
warlike people, were little inclined to commercial pur- 
suits; they remained far behind the rest of the Greeks 
in culture, and scarcely one city of importance was em- 
braced within their territory. 

4. JEto'lia, generally a rough and mountainous coun- 
try, separated, on the west, from Acarnania by the river 
Ach-e-lo'ns, the largest of the rivers of Greece, was in- 
habited, like Acarnania, by a hardy and warlike race, 
who long preserved the wild and uncivilized habits of 
a barbarous age. The river Achelous was intimately 
connected with the religion and mythology of the 
Greeks. The hero Hercules contended with the river- 
god for the hand of De-i-a-ni'ra, the most beautiful wom- 
an of his time ; and so famous was the stream itself that 
the Oracle of Dodona gave frequent directions " to sac- 
rifice to the Achelous," whose very name was used, in 
the language of poetry, as an appellation for the element 
of water and for rivers. 

5. Lo'cris, lying along the Corinthian Gulf east of 
iEtolia, was inhabited by a wild, uncivilized race, scarce- 
ly Hellenic in character, and said to have been addicted, 
from the earliest period, to theft and rapine. Their two 
principal towns were Amphis'sa and Naupac'tus, the lat- 
ter now called Lepanto. There was another settlement 
of the Locri north" of Pho'cis and Boeo'tia. 

6. Do'ris, a small territory in the north-eastern angle 
of iEtolia proper — a rough but fertile country — was the 
early seat of the Dorians, the most enterprising and the 
most powerful of the Hellenic tribes, if we take into 
account their numerous migrations, colonies, and con- 
quests. Their colonies in Asia Minor founded six in- 



6 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

dependent republics, which were confined within the 
bounds of as many cities. From this people the Doric 
order of architecture— a style typical of majesty and 
imposing grandeur, and tire one the most employed by 
the Greeks in the construction of their temples— derived 

its origin. 

7. Pho'cis.— On the east of Locris, JEtolia, and Do- 
ris was Phocis, a mountainous region, bordered on the 
south by the Corinthian Gulf. In the northern central 
part of its territory was the famed Mount Parnassus, 
covered the greater part of the year with snow, with its 
sacred cave, and its Castalian fount gushing forth be- 
tween two of its lofty rocks. The waters were said to 
inspire those who drank of them with the gift of poetry. 
Hence both mountain and fount were sacred to the 
Muses, and their names have come down to our own 
times as synonymous with poetry and song. Byron 
thus writes of Parnassus, in lines almost of veneration, 
as he first viewed it from Delphi, on the southern base 
of the mountain : 

Ob, thou Parnassus ! whom I now survey, 

Not in the frenzy of a dreamer's eye, 

Not in the fabled landscape of a lay, 

But soaring snow-clad through thy native sky 

In the wild pomp of mountain majesty ! 

Oft have I dreamed of thee ! whose glorious name 

Who knows not, knows not man's divinest lore : 

And now I view thee, 'tis, alas ! with shame 

That I in feeblest accents must adore. 

When I recount thy worshippers of yore 

I tremble, and can only bend the knee ; 

Nor raise my voice, nor vainly dare to soar, 

But gaze beneath thy cloudy canopy 

In silent joy to think at last I look on thee ! 



VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 7 

The city of Delphi was the seat of the celebrated 
temple and oracle of that name. Here the Pythia, the 
priestess of Apollo, pronounced the prophetic responses, 
in extempore prose or verse ; and here the Pythian 
Games were celebrated in honor of Apollo. 

Here, thought-entranced, we wander, where of old 
From Delphi's chasm the mystic vapor rose, 
And trembling nations heard their doom foretold 
By the dread spirit throned 'midst rocks and snows. 
Though its rich fanes be blended with the dust, 
And silence now the hallowed haunt possess, 
Still is the scene of ancient rites august, 
Magnificent in mountain loneliness ; 
Still Inspiration hovers o'er the ground, 
Where Greece her councils held, her Pythian victors crowned. 

Mus. Hemans. 

8. Bceo'tia.— Bceotia, lying to the east of Phocis, 
bordering on the Euri'pus, or " Euboe'an Sea," a narrow 
strait which separates it from the Island of Eubce'a, and 
touching the Corinthian Gulf on the south-west, is most- 
ly one large basin enclosed by mountain ranges, and hav- 
ing a soil exceedingly fertile. It was the most thickly 
settled part of Greece; it abounded in cities of historic 
interest, of which Thebes, the capital, was the chief— 
whose walls were built, according to the fable, to the 
sound of the Muses : 

With their ninefold symphonies 
There the chiming Muses throno- • 

Stone on stone the walls arise 

To the choral Music-song. Schiller. 

Bceotia was the scene of many of the legends celebrated 
by the poets, and especially of those upon which were 
founded the plays of the Greek tragedians. Near a 



8 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

fountain on Mount Cithae'ron, on its southern border, 
the hunter Actse'on, having been changed into a stag by 
the goddess Diana, was hunted down and killed by his 
own hounds. Pen'theus, an early king of Thebes, hav- 
ing ascended Cithseron to witness the orgies of the Bac- 
chanals, was torn in pieces by his own mother and aunts, 
to whom Bacchus made him appear as a wild beast. On 
this same mountain range also occurred the exposure of 
(Ed'ipus, the hero of the most famous tragedy of Soph- 
ocles. Near the Corinthian Gulf was Mount Hel'icon, 
sacred to Apollo and the Muses. Its slopes and valleys 
were renowned for their fertility; it had its sacred grove, 
and near it was the famous fountain of Aganip'pe, 
which w r as believed to inspire with oracular powers 
those who drank of its waters. Nearer the summit was 
the fountain Hippocre'ne, which is said to have burst 
forth when the winged horse Peg'asus, the favorite of 
the Muses, struck the ground with his hoofs, and which 
Venus, accompanied by her constant attendants, the 
doves, delighted to visit. Here, we are told, 

Her darling doves, light-hovering round their Queen, 
Dipped their red beaks in rills from Hippocrene. 1 

It was here, also — 

near this fresh fount, 

* On pleasant Helicon's umbrageous mount — 

that occurred the celebrated contest between the nine 
daughters of Pie'rus, king of E-ma'thi-a (the ancient 
name of Macedonia), and the nine Muses. It is said that 
" at the sons; of the daughters of Pierus the sky became 
dark, and all nature was put out of harmony ; but at 
that of the Muses the heavens themselves, the stars, the 



1 Always Hip-po-cre'ne in prose ; but it is allowable to contract it into 
tbree syllables in poetry, as in the example above. 



VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 9 

sea, and the risers stood motionless, and Helicon swelled 
np with delight, so that its summit reached the sky." 
The Muses then, having turned the presumptuous maid- 
ens into chattering magpies, first took the name of Pi- 
er'i-des, from Pieria, their natal region. 

9. Attica.— Bordering Bceotia on the south-east w T as 
the district of Attica, nearly in the form of a triangle, 
having two of its sides washed by the sea, and the other 
—the northern— shut off from the east of Central Greece 
by the mountain range of Cithseron on the north-west, 
and Par'nes on the east. Its other noted mountains 
were Pentel'icus (sometimes called Mende'li), so cele- 
brated for its quarries of beautiful marble, and Ilymet'- 
tus, celebrated for its excellent honey, and the broad belt 
of flowers at its base, which scented the air with their 
delicious perfume. It could boast of its chief city, the 
favored seat of the goddess Minerva- 
Athens, the eye of Greece, mother of arts 
And eloquence — 

as surpassing all other cities in beauty and magnificence, 
and in the great number of its illustrious citizens. Yet 
the soil of Attica was, on the whole, exceedingly barren, 
with the exception of a few very fertile spots; but olive 
groves abounded, and the olive was the most valuable 
product. ^ 

The general sterility of Attica was the great safety 
of her people in their early history. " It drove them 
abroad ; it filled them with a spirit of activity, which 
loved to grapple with danger and difficulty; it told them 
that, if they would maintain themselves in the dignity 
which became them, they must regard the resources of 
their own land as nothing, and those of other countries 
as their own." Added to this, the situation of Attica 
marked it out in an eminent manner for a commercial 



-* *• 

« 



10 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

country ; and it became distinguished beyond all the 
other states of Greece for its extensive commercial re- 
lations, while its climate was deemed the most favorable 
of all the regions of the civilized world for the physical 
and intellectual development of man. It was called "a 
sunny land," and, notwithstanding the infertility of its 
soil, it was full of picturesque beauty. The poet Byron, 
in his apostrophe to Greece, makes many striking and 
beautiful allusions to the Attica of his own time : 

Yet are thy skies as blue, thy crags as wild ; 
Sweet are thy groves, and verdant are thy fields, 
Thine olive ripe as when Minerva smiled, 
And still its honeyed wealth Hymettus yields. 
There the blithe bee his fragrant fortress builds, 
The freeborn wanderer of thy mountain air; 
Apollo still thy long, long summer gilds, 
Still in his beam Mendeli's marbles glare ; 
Art, Glory, Freedom fail, but Nature still is fair. 

10. Entering now upon the isthmus which leads into 
Southern Greece, we find the little state of Corinth, 
with its famous city of the same name, keeping guard 
over the narrow pass, with one foot on the Corinthi- 
an Gulf and the other on the Saron'ic, thereby com- 
manding both the Ionian and iEge'an seas, controlling 
the commerce that passed between them, and holding 
the keys of Peloponnesus. It was a mountainous and 
barren region, with the exception of a small plain north- 
west of the city. Thus situated, Corinth early became 
the seat of opulence and the arts, which rendered her 
the ornament of Greece. On a lofty eminence over- 
hanging the city, forming a conspicuous object at a 
great distance, was her famous citadel — so important 
as to be styled by Philip of Macedon "the fetters of 
Greece." Kising abruptly nearly two thousand feet 



VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 11 

above the surrounding plain, the hill itself, in its natural 
defences, is the strongest mountain fortress in Europe. 

The whirlwind's wrath, the earthquake's shock, 

Have left untouched her hoary rock. 

The key-stone of a land which still, 

Though fallen, looks proudly on that hill, 

The landmark to the double tide 

That purpling rolls on either side, 

As if their waters chafed to meet, 

Yet pause and crouch beneath her feet. Byron. 

The ascent to the citadel, in the days of Corinthian 
glory, was lined on both sides with temples and altars; 
but temples and altars are gone, and citadel and city 
alike are now in ruins. Antip'ater of Sidon describes 
the city as a scene of desolation after it had been con- 
quered, plundered, and its walls thrown down by the 
Eomans, 146 b.c. Although the city was partially re- 
built, the description is fully applicable to its present 
condition. A modern traveller thus describes the site 
of the ancient city : 

The hoarse wind sighs around the mouldering walls 
Of the vast theatre, like the deep roar 
Of distant waves, or the tumultuous rush 
Of multitudes : the lichen creeps along 
Each yawning crevice, and the wild-flower hano-s 
Its long festoons around each crumbling stone. 
The window's arch and massive buttress glow 
With time's deep tints, whilst cypress shadows wave 
On high, and spread a melancholy gloom. 

Silent forever is the voice 
Of Tragedy and Eloquence. In climes 
Far distant, and beneath a cloudy sky, 
The echo of their harps is heard ; but all 
The soul-subduing energy is fled. Hatgarth. 



12 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

11. Adjoining the Corinthian territory on the west, 
and extending about sixty-five miles along the southern 
coast of the Corinthian Gulf, was Aclxa'ia, mountain- 
ous in the interior; but its coast region for the most part 
was level, exposed to inundations, and without a single 
harbor of any size. Hence the Achse'ans were never 
famous for maritime enterprise. Of the eleven Achaean 
cities that formed the celebrated Achaean league, Pa'trse 
(now Patras') alone survives. Si'cy-on, on the eastern 
border of Achaia, was at times an independent state. 

12. South of Achaia was the central region of Arca- 
dia, surrounded by a ring of mountains, and completely 
encompassed by the other states of the Peloponnesus, 
Next to Laconia it was the largest of the ancient divis- 
ions of Greece, and the most picturesque and beautiful 
portion (not unlike- Switzerland in its mountain charac- 
ter), and without either seaports or navigable rivers. It 
was inhabited by a people simple in their habits and 
manners, noted for their fondness for music and dancing, 
their hospitality, and pastoral customs. With the poets 
Arcadia was a land of peace, of simple pleasures, and 
untroubled quiet ; and it was natural that the pipe-p%- 
ing Pan should first appear here, where musical shep- 
herds led their flocks along the woody vales of impet- 
uous streams. 

13. Ar'golis, east of Arcadia, was mostly a rocky pen- 
insula lying between the Saron'ic and Argol'ic gulfs. 
It was in great part a barren region, with the exception 
of the plain adjoining its capital city, Argos, and in early 
times was divided into a number of small but indepen- 
dent kingdoms, that afterward became republics. The 
whole region is rich in historic associations of the Heroic 
Ao-e. Here was Tir'yns, whose massive walls were built 
by the one-eyed Cy'clops, and whence Hercules departed 
at the commencement of his twelve labors. Here, also, 



VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 13 

was the Lernae'an Lake, where the hero slew the many- 
headed hydra; JSVmea, the haunt of the lion slain by 
Hercules, and the seat of the celebrated JNVmean games; 
and Myce'nse, the royal city of Agamemnon, who com- 
manded the Greeks in the Trojan War— now known 
only by its ruins and its legends of by-gone ages. 

And still have legends marked the lonely spot 
Where low the dust of Agamemnon lies ; 

And shades of kings and leaders unforgot, 

Hovering around, to fancy's vision rise. Hemans. 

14. At the south-eastern extremity of the Pelopon- 
nesus was Laconia, the fertile portions of which con- 
sisted mostly of a long, narrow valley, shut in on three 
sides by the mountain ranges of Ta-yg'etus on the west 
and Parnon on the north and east, and open only on the 
south to the sea. Through this valley flows the river 
Euro'tas, on whose banks, about twenty miles from the 
sea, stood the capital city, Lacedse'mon, or Sparta, which 
was unwalled and unfortified during its most flourishing 
period, as the Spartans held that the real defence of a 
town consists solely in the valor of its citizens. The 
sea-coast of Laconia was lined with towns, and furnished 
with numerous ports and commodious harbors. While 
Sparta was equalled by few other Greek cities in the 
magnificence of its temples and statues, the private 
houses, and even the palace of the king, were always 
simple and unadorned. 

15. West of Laconia was Messe'nia, the south-west- 
ern division of Greece, a mountainous country, but with 
many fertile intervening valleys, the whole renowned 
for the^ mildness and salubrity of its climate. Its prin- 
cipal river, the Pami'sus, rising in the mountains of 
Arcadia, flows southward to the Messenian Gulf through 
a beautiful plain, the lower portion of which was so eel- 



14 MOSAICS OF GEECIAN HISTORY. 

ebrated for its fertility that it was called Maea'ria, or 
" the blessed ;" and even to this day it is covered with 
plantations of the vine, the fig, and the mulberry, and is 
" as rich in cultivation as can be well imagined." 

16. One district more— that of E'lis, north of Messe- 
nia and west of Arcadia, and embracing the western 
slopes of the Achaian and Arcadian mountains — makes 
up the complement of the ancient Peloponnesian states. 
Though hilly and mountainous, like Messenia, it had 
many valleys and hill-sides of great fertility. The river 
Alphe'us, which the poets have made the most cele- 
brated of the rivers of Greece, flows westward through 
Elis to the Ionian Sea, and on its banks was Olympia, 
the renowned seat of the Olympian games. Here, also, 
was the sacred grove of olive and plane trees, within 
which were temples, monuments, and statues, erected in 
honor of gods, heroes, and conquerors. In the very 
midst stood the great temple of Jupiter, which con- 
tained the colossal gold and ivory statue of the god, 
the masterpiece of the sculptor Phidias. Hence, by the 
common law of Greece Elis was deemed a sacred terri- 
tory, and its cities were unwalled, as they were thought 
to be sufficiently protected by the sanctity of the coun- 
try; and it was only when the ancient faith began to 
give way that the sacred character of Elis was disre- 
garded. 

17. The Isles of G-reece. — 

The Isles of Greece ! the Isles of Greece ! 

Where burning Sappho loved and sung — 
Where grew the arts of war and peace, 

Where Delos rose and Phoebus sprung ! 
Eternal summer gilds them yet, 
But all except their sun is set. Byron. 

The main-land of Greece was deeply indented by gulfs 



VIEW OF THE GKECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 15 

and almost land-locked bays, and the shores were lined 
with numerous islands, which were occupied by the 
Grecian race. Beginning our survey of these in the 
northern ^Ege'an, we find, off the coast of Thessaly, the 
Island of Lemnos, which is fabled as the spot on which 
the fire-god Yulcan — the Lucifer of heathen mythol- 
ogy— fell, after being hurled down from Olympus. 
Under a volcano of -the island he established his work- 
shop, and there forged the thunder-bolts of Jupiter and 
the arms of the gods and of godlike heroes. 

Of the Grecian islands proper, the largest is Eubce'a, 
a long and narrow island lying east of Central Greece, 
from which it is separated by the narrow channel of the 
Euri'pus, or Eubce'an Sea. South-east of Euboea are 
the Cyc'la-des, 1 a large group that kept guard around the 
sacred Island of Delos, which is said to have risen unex- 
pectedly out of the sea. The Spor'a-des 2 were another 
group, scattered over the sea farther east, toward the 
coast of Asia Minor. The large islands of Crete and 
Ehodes were south-east of these groups. In the Saron'ic 
Gulf, between Attica and Ar'golis, were the islands of 
Sal'amis and ^Egi'na, the former the scene of the great 
naval conflict between the Greeks on the one side and 
the Persians, under Xerxes, on the other, and the latter 
long the maritime rival of Athens. 

Cyth'era, now Cer'igo, an island of great importance 
to the Spartans, was separated by a narrow channel 
from the southern extremity of Laconia. It was on the 
coast of this island that the goddess Venus is fabled to 
have first appeared to mortals as she arose out of the 
foam of the sea, having a beautifully enamelled shell for 



1 From the Greek word kuklos, a circle. 

2 From the Greek word speiro, to sow ; scattered, like seed, so numerous 
were they. Hence our word spores. 



16 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

her chariot, drawn by dolphins, as some paintings repre- 
sent ; but others picture her as borne on a shining sea- 
horse. She was first called Cyth-er-e'a, from the name 
of the island. The nymphs of ocean, of the land, and 
the streams, the fishes and monsters of the deep, and 
the birds of heaven, with rapturous delight greeted her 
coming, and did homage to the beauty of the Queen of 
Love. * The following tine description of the scene, truly 
Grecian in spirit, is by a modern poet : 

Uprisen from the sea when Cytherea, 

Shining in primal beauty, paled the day, 

The wondering waters hushed. They yearned in sighs 

That shook the world — tumultuously heaved 

To a great throne of azure laced with light 

And canopied in foam to grace their queen. 

Shrieking for joy came O-ce-an'i-des, 

And swift Ner-e'i-des rushed from afar, 

Or clove the waters by. Came eager-eyed 

Even shy Na-i'a-des from inland streams, 

With wild cries headlong darting through the waves ; 

And Dryads from the shore stretched their long arms, 

While, hoarsely sounding, heard was Triton's shell ; 

Shoutings uncouth, bewildered sounds, 

And innumerable splashing feet 

Of monsters gambolling around their god, 

Forth shining on a sea-horse, fierce and finned. 

Some bestrode fishes glinting dusky gold, 

Or angry crimson, or chill silver bright; 

Others jerked fast on their own scanty tails ; 

And sea-birds, screaming upward either side, 

Wove a vast arch above the Queen of Love, 

Who, gazing on this multitudinous 

Homaging to her beauty, laughed. She laughed 

The soft, delicious laughter that makes mad ; 

Low warblings in the throat, that clinch man's life 

Tighter than prison bars. Thomas Woolner. 



VIEW OF THE GRECIAN STATES AND ISLANDS. 17 

Off the coast of Elis were the two small islands 
called the Stroph'a-des, noted as the place of habitation 
of those fabled winged monsters, the Harpies. Here 
JSne'as landed in his flight from the ruins of Troy, but 
no pleasant greetings met him there. 

" At length I land upon the Strophades, 
Safe from the dangers of the stormy seas. 
Those isles arc compassed by th' Ionian main, 
The dire abode where the foul Harpies reign : 
Monsters more fierce offended Heaven ne'er sent 
From hell's abyss for human punishment. 
We spread the tables on the greensward ground ; 
We feed with hunger, and the bowls go round ; 
When from the mountain-tops, with hideous cry 
And clattering wings, the hungry Harpies fly : ' 
They snatch the meat, defiling all they find, 
And, parting, leave a loathsome stench behind." 

Virgil's ^Eneicl, B. III. 

North of the Strophades, along the western coast of 
Greece, were the six_Ionjan islands known in Grecian 
history as Paxos, Zacyn'thus, Cephalo'nia, Ithaca (the 
native island of Ulysses), Leu'cas (or Leuca'dia), and 
Corcy'ra (now Corfu), which latter island Homer calls 
Phaea'cia, and where he places the fabled gardens of 
Alcin'o-us. It was King Alcinons who kindly enter- 
tained Ulysses in his island home when the latter was 
shipwrecked on his coast. He is highly praised in Gre- 
cian legends for his love of agriculture; and his gar- 
dens, so beautifully described by Homer, have afforded 
a favorite theme for poets of succeeding ages. Homer's 
description is as follows : 

Close to the gates a spacious garden lies, 
From storms defended and inclement skies; 
Four acres was the allotted space of ground, 
Fenced with a green enclosure all around ; 



18 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Tall thriving trees confessed the fruitful mould, 

And reddening apples ripen here to gold. 

Here the blue fig with luscious juice o'erflows; 

With deeper red the full pomegranate glows ; 

The branch here bends beneath the weighty pear, 

And verdant olives flourish round the year. 

The balmy spirit of the western gale 

Eternal breathes on fruits untaught to fail ; 

Each dropping pear a following pear supplies ; 

On apples apples, figs on figs arise : 

The same mild season gives the blooms to blow, 

The buds to harden, and the fruits to grow. 
Here ordered vines in equal ranks appear, 

With all the united labors of the year ; 

Some to unload the fertile branches run, 
Some dry the blackening clusters in the sun, 
Others to tread the liquid harvest join, 
The groaning presses foam with floods of wine. 
Here are the vines in early flower descried, 
Here grapes discolored on the sunny side, 
And there in Autumn's richest purple dyed. 
Beds of all various herbs, forever green, 
In beauteous order terminate the scene. 

Two plenteous fountains the whole prospect crowned : 
This through the garden leads its streams around, 
Visits each plant, and waters all the ground ; 
While that in pipes beneath the palace flows, 
And thence its current on the town bestows. 
To various use their various streams they bring ; 
The people one, and one supplies the king. 

Odyssey, B. VII. Pope's Trans. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 19 



CHAPTER II. 

THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD OF 
GRECIAN HISTORY. 

I. GRECIAN MYTHOLOGY. 

As the Greeks, in common with the Egyptians and 
other Eastern nations, placed the reign of the gods an- 
terior to the race of mortals, Grecian mythology— -which 
is a system of myths, or fabulous opinions and doctrines 
respecting the universe and the deities who were sup- 
posed to preside over it— forms the most natural and 
appropriate introduction to Grecian history. 

Our principal knowledge of this system is derived 
from the works of Homer, He'si-od, and other ancient 
writers, who have gathered the floating legends of which 
it consists into tales and epic poems, many of them of 
great power and beauty. Some of these legends are 
exceedingly natural and pleasing, while others shock 
and disgust us by the gross impossibilities and hideous 
deformities which they reveal. Yet these legends are \ 
the spontaneous and the earliest growth of the Grecian 
mind, and were long accepted by the people as serious 
realities. They are, therefore, to be viewed as expo- 
nents of early Grecian philosophy,— of all that the early' | 
Greeks believed, and felt, and conjectured, respecting 
the universe and its government, and respecting the 
social relations, duties, and destiny of mankind, — and 
their influence upon national character was great. As 
a Scotch poet and scholar of our own day well remarks, 






20 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Old fables these, and fancies old ! 

But not with hasty pride 
Let logic cold and reason bold 

Cast these old dreams aside. 
Dreams are not false in all their scope : 

Oft from the sleepy lair 
Start giant shapes of fear and hope 

That, aptly read, declare 
Our deepest nature. God in dreams 

Hath spoken to the wise ; 
And in a people's mythic themes 

A people's wisdom lies. J. Stuart Blackie. 

According to Grecian philosophy, first in the order of 
time came Cha'os, a heterogeneous mass, containing all 
the seeds of nature. This was formed by the hand of 
an unknown god into "broad-breasted Earth "(the mother 
of the gods), who produced U'ranus, or Heaven. Then 
Earth married Uranus, or Heaven; and from this union 
came a numerous and powerful brood — the Ti'tans, and 
the Cyclo'pes, and the gods of the wintry season (Kof- 
tos, Bria're-us, and Gy'ges, who had each a hundred 
hands), supposed to be personifications of the hail, the 
rain, and the snow. 

The Titans made war upon their father, Uranus, who 
was wounded by Chro'nos, or Saturn, the youngest and 
bravest of his sons. From the drops of blood which 
flowed from the wound and fell upon the earth sprung 
the Furies, the Giants, and the Median nymphs ; and 
from those which fell into the sea sprung Venus, the 
goddess of love and beauty. Uranus being dethroned, 
Saturn was permitted by his brethren to reign, on con- 
dition that he would destroy all his male children. But 
Rhe'a (his wife), unwilling to see her children perish, 
concealed from him the birth of Zeus' (or Jupiter), 
Pos-ei'don (or Neptune), and Pluto. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 21 

THE BATTLE OF THE GIANTS. 

The Titans, informed that Saturn had saved his chil- 
dren, made war upon him and dethroned him ; but he 
was soon restored by his son Jupiter. Yet Jupiter soon 
afterward conspired against his father, and after a long 
war with him and his giant progeny, that lasted full ten 
years, he drove Saturn from the kingdom, which he 
held against the repeated assaults of all the gods, who 
were finally destroyed or imprisoned by his overmaster- 
ing power. This contest is termed "the Battle of the 
Giants," and is very celebrated in Grecian mythology. 
The description of it which Hesiod has given in his 
Theogony is considered " one of the most sublime pas- 
sages in classical poetry, conceived with great boldness, 
and executed witii a power and force which show a 
masterly though rugged genius. It will bear a favor- 
able comparison with Milton's < Battle of the Angels,' 
in Paradise Lost." We subjoin the following extracts 
from it : 

Th' immeasurable sea tremendous dashed 

With roaring, earth resounded, the broad heaven 

Groaned, shattering ; huge Olympus reeled throughout, 

Down to its rooted base, beneath the rush 

Of those immortals. The dark chasm of hell 

Was shaken with the trembling, with the tramp 

Of hollow footsteps and strong battle-strokes, 

And measureless uproar of wild pursuit. 

So they against each other through the air 

Hurled intermixed their weapons, scattering groans 

Where'er they fell. 

The voice of armies rose 
With rallying shout through the starred firmament, 
And with a mighty war-cry both the hosts 



22 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Encountering closed. Nor longer then did Jove 
Curb down his force, but sudden in his soul 
There grew dilated strength, and it was filled 
With his omnipotence ; his whole of might 
Broke from him, and the godhead rushed abroad. 
The vaulted sky, the Mount Olympus, flashed 
With his continual presence, for he passed 
Incessant forth, and lightened where he trod. 

Thrown from his nervous grasp the lightnings flew, 
Reiterated swift ; the whirling flash 
Cast sacred splendor, and the thunder-bolt 
Fell. Then on every side the foodful earth 
Roared in the burning flame, and far and near 
The trackless depth of forests crashed with fire ; 
Yea, the broad earth burned red, the floods of Nile 
Glowed, and the desert waters of the sea. 

Round and round the Titans' earthy forms 
Rolled the hot vapor, and on fiery surge 
Streamed upward, swathing in one boundless blaze 
The purer air of heaven. Keen rushed the light 
In quivering splendor from the writhen flash ; 
Strong though they were, intolerable smote 
Their orbs of sight, and with bedimming glare 
Scorched up their blasted vision. Through the gulf 
Of yawning chaos the supernal flame 
Spread, mingling fire with darkness. 

The whirlwinds were abroad, and hollow aroused 
A shaking and a gathering dark of dust, 
Crushing the thunders from the clouds of air, 
Hot thunder-bolts and flames, the fiery darts 
Of Jove ; and in the midst of either host 
They bore upon their blast the cry confused 
Of battle, and the shouting. For the din 
Tumultuous of that sight-appalling strife 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 23 

Rose without bound. Stern strength of hardy proof 
Wreaked there its deeds, till weary sank the war. 

Trans, by Elton. 

Thus Jupiter, or Jove, became the head of the uni- 
verse; and to him is ascribed the creation of the subse- 
quent gods, of man, and of all animal life, and the su- 
preme control and government of all. His supremacy 
is beautifully sung in the following hymn by the Greek 
philosopher Cle-an'thes, said to be the only one of his 
numerous writings that has been preserved. Like many 
others of the ancient hymns of adoration, it presents us 
with high spiritual conceptions of the unity and attri- 
butes of Deity ; and had it been addressed to Jehovah 
it would have been deemed a grand tribute to his maj- 
esty, and a noble specimen of deep devotional feeling. 

Hymn to Jupiter. 

Most glorious of th' immortal powers above — 
O thou of many names — mysterious Jove ! 
For evermore almighty ! Nature's source, 
That govern'st all things in their ordered course, 
All hail to thee ! Since, innocent of blame, 
E'en mortal creatures may address thy name — 
For all that breathe and creep the lowly earth 
Echo thy being with reflected birth — 
Thee will I sing, thy strength for aye resound ! 
The universe that rolls this globe around 
Moves wheresoe'er thy plastic influence guides, 
And, ductile, owns the god whose arm presides. 

The lightnings are thy ministers of ire, 
The double-forked and ever-livino- fire : 

O 7 

In thy unconquerable hand they glow, 
And at the flash all nature quakes below. 
Thus, thunder-armed, thou dost creation draw 
To one immense, inevitable law ; 



24 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

And with the various mass of breathing souls 
Thy power is mingled and thy spirit rolls. 
Dread genius of creation ! all things bow 
To thee ! the universal monarch thou ! 
Nor aught is done without thy wise control 
On earth, or sea, or round the ethereal pole, 
Save when the wicked, in their frenzy blind, 
Act o'er the follies of a senseless mind. 

Thou curb'st th' excess; confusion to thy sight 

Moves regular ; th' unlovely scene is bright. 

Thy hand, educing good from evil, brings 

To one apt harmony the strife of things. 

One ever-during law still binds the whole, 

Though shunned, resisted, by the sinner's soul. 

Wretches! while still they course the glittering prize. 

The law of God eludes their ears and eyes. 

Life then were virtue, did they this obey ; 

But wide from life's chief good they headlong stray. 

Now glory's arduous toils the breast inflame ; 
Now avarice thirsts, insensible of shame ; 
Now sloth unnerves them in voluptuous ease, 
And the sweet pleasures of the body please. 
With eager haste they rush the gulf within, 
And their whole souls are centred in their sin. 
But oh, great Jove! by whom all good is given — 
Dweller with lio-htnino-s and the clouds of heaven — 
Save from their dreadful error lost mankind ! 
Father, disperse these shadows of the mind ! 
Give them thy pure and righteous law to know, 
Wherewith thy justice governs all below. 
Thus honored by the knowledge of thy way, 
Shall men that honor to thyself repay, 
And bid thy mighty works in praises ring, 
As well befits a mortal's lips to sing ; 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 25 

More blest nor men nor heavenly powers can be 
Than when their songs are of thy law and thee. 

Trans, by Elton. 

Jupiter is said to have divided the' dominion of the 
universe between himself and his two brothers, Nep- 
tune and Pluto, taking heaven as his own portion, and 
having his throne and holding his court on Mount 
Olympus, in Thessaly, while he assigned the dominion 
of the sea to Neptune, and to Pluto the lower regions— 
the abodes of the dead. Jupiter had several wives, both 
goddesses and mortals; but last of all he married his 
sister Juno, who maintained permanently the dignity of 
queen of the gods. The offspring of Jupiter were nu- 
merous, comprising both celestial and terrestrial divini- 
ties. The most noted of the former were Mars, the god 
of war; Vulcan, the god of fire (the Olympian artist 
who forged the thunder-bolts of Jupiter and the arms 
of all the gods) ; and Apollo, the god of archery, proph- 
ecy, music, and medicine. 

'' Mine is the invention of the charming lyre ; 
Sweet notes, and heavenly numbers I inspire. 
Med'cine is mine : what herbs and simples grow 
In fields and forests, all their powers I know, 
And am the great physician called below." 

Apollo to Daphne, in Ovid's Metam. Dryden's Trans. 

Then come Mercury, the winged messenger, interpret- 
er and ambassador of the gods ; Diana, queen of the 
woods and goddess of hunting, and hence the counter- 
part of her brother Apollo ; and finally, Minerva, the 
goddess of wisdom and skill, who is said to have spruno- 
full-armed from the brain of Jupiter. 

Besides these divinities there were many others— 
as Ceres, the goddess of grain and harvests; and Vesta, 
the goddess of home joys and comforts, who presided 

2 



26 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

over the sanctity of the domestic hearth. There were 
also inferior gods and goddesses innumerable— such as 
deities of the woods and the mountains, the meadows 
and the rivers— some terrestrial, others celestial, accord- 
ing to the places over which they were supposed to 
preside, and rising in importance in proportion to the 
powers they manifested. Even the Muses, the Fates, 
and the Graces were numbered among Grecian deities. 
But while, undoubtedly, the great mass of the Grecian 
people believed that their divinities were real persons, 
who presided over the affairs of men, their philosophers, 
while encouraging this belief as the best adapted to the 
understanding of the people, took quite a different view 
of them, and explained the mythological legends as alle- 
gorical representations of general physical and moral 
truths. Thus, while Jupiter, to the vulgar mind, was 
the god of the upper regions, " who dwelt on the sum- 
mits of the highest mountains, gathered the clouds 
about him, shook the air with his thunder, and wielded 
the lightning as the instrument of his wrath," yet in all 
this he was but the symbol of the ether or atmosphere 
which surrounds the earth; and hence the numerous 
fables of this monarch of the gods may be considered 
merely as allegories which typify the great generative 
power of the universe, displaying itself in a variety of 
ways, and under the greatest diversity of forms. So, 
also, Apollo was, in all likelihood, originally the sun-god 
of the Asiatic nations, displaying all the attributes of 
that luminary ; and because fire is the great agent in re- 
ducing and working the metals, Vulcan, the fire-god, nat- 
urally became an artist, and is represented as working 
with hammer and tongs at his anvil. Thus the Greeks, 
instead of worshipping Nature, worshipped the Powers 
of Nature, as personified in the almost infinite number 
of their deities. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 27 

The process by which the beings of Grecian mythol- 
ogy came into existence, among an ardent and super- 
stitions people, is beautifully described by the poet 
Wordsworth as very naturally arising out of the 

Teeming Fancies of the Greek Mind. 

The lively Grecian, in a land of hills, 

Rivers, arid fertile plains, and sounding shores, 

Under a copse of variegated sky, 

Could find commodious place for every god. 

In that fair clime the lonely herdsman, stretched 

On the soft grass through half a summer's day, 

With music lulled his- indolent repose; 

And in some fit of weariness, if he, 

When his own breath was silent, chanced to hear 

A distant strain, far sweeter than the sounds 

Which his poor skill could make, his fancy fetch'd 

Even from the blazing chariot of the sun 

A beardless youth, who touched a golden lute, 

And filled the illumined groves with ravishment. 

The nightly hunter, lifting a bright eye 

Up toward the crescent moon, with grateful heart 

Called on the lovely wanderer who bestow'd 

That timely light to share his joyous sport. 

And hence a beaming goddess, with her nymphs, 

Across the lawn, and through the darksome grove 

(Not unaccompanied with tuneful notes, 

By echo multiplied from rock or cave), 

Swept in the storm of chase, as moon and stars 

Glance rapidly along the clouded heaven 

When winds are blowing strong. The traveller slaked 

His thirst from rill or gushing fount, and thank'd 

The Naiad. Sunbeams, upon distant hills 

Gliding apace, with shadows in their train, 

Might, with small help from fancy, be transformed 

Into fleet Oreads sporting visibly. 



28 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The Zephyrs fanning, as they passed, their wings, 
Lacked not for love fair objects, whom they wooed 
With gentle whisper. Withered boughs grotesque, 
Stripped of their leaves and twigs by hoary age, 
From depth of shaggy covert peeping forth 
In the low vale, or on steep mountain side — 
And sometimes intermixed with stirring horns 
Of the live deer, or goat's depending beard — 
These were the lurking Satyrs, a wild brood 
Of gamesome deities ; or Pan himself, 
The simple shepherd's awe-inspiring god. 

Similar ideas are expressed in an article on the Na- 
ture of Early History r , by a celebrated English scholar, 1 
who says: "The legends, or mythic fables, of the 
Greeks are chiefly connected with religious ideas, and 
may mostly be traced to that sort of awe or wonder 
with which simple and uneducated minds regard the 
changes and movements of the natural world. The di- 
rect and easy way in which the imagination of such 
persons accounts for marvellous phenomena, is to refer 
them to the operation of Persons. When the attention 
is excited by the regular movements of sun, and moon, 
and stars, by the alternations of day and night, by the 
recurrence of the seasons, by the rising and falling of 
the seas, by the ceaseless flow of rivers, by the gather- 
ing of clouds, the rolling of thunder, and the flashing 
of lightning, by the operations of life in the vegetable 
and animal worlds — in short, by any exhibition of an 
active and motive power — it is natural for uninstructed 
minds to consider such changes and movements as the 
work of divine Persons. In this manner the early 
Greek legends associate themselves with personifica- 
tions of the powers of Nature. All attempts to account 



Henry George Licldcll, D.D., Dean of Christchurch College, Oxford. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 29 

for the marvels which surround us are foregone ; every- 
thing is referred to the immediate operation of a god. 
' Cloud-compelling Zeus ' is the author of the phenom- 
enon of the air ; < Earth-shaking Pos-ei'don,' of all that 
happens in the water under the earth ; nymphs are at- 
tached to every spring or tree; De-me'ter, or Mother 
Earth, for six months rejoices in the presence of Pros- 
erpine, 1 the green herb, her daughter, and for six months 
regrets her absence in dark abodes beneath the earth. 

" This tendency to deify the powers of Nature is due 
partly to a clear atmosphere and sunny climate, which 
incline a people to live much in the opeii air in close 
communion with all that Nature offers to charm the 
senses and excite the imagination ; partly to the charac- 
ter of the people, and partly to the poets who in early 
times wrought these legendary tales into works which 
are read with increased delight in ages when science 
and method have banished the simple faith which pro- 
cured acceptance for these legends. 

"Among the Greeks all these conditions were found 
existing. They lived, so to say, out-of-doors; their 
powers of observation were extremely quick, and their 
imagination singularly vivid ; and their ancient poems 
are the most noble specimens of the old legendary tales 
that have been preserved in any country." 

This tendency of the Grecian mind is also very hap- 
pily set forth in the following lines by Professor 
Blackie : 

The old Greek men, the old Greek men — 

No blinking fools were they, 
But with a free and broad-eyed ken 

Looked forth on glorious day. 



1 In some legends Proserpine is regarded as the daughter of Mother 
Earth, or Ceres, and a personification of the growing corn. 



30 MOSAICS OF GEECIAN HISTOEY, 

They looked on the sun in their cloudless sky, 
And they saw that his light was fair; 

And they said that the round, full-beaming eye 
Of a blazing god was there! 

They looked on the vast spread Earth, and saw 
The various fashioned forms, with awe, 

Of green and creeping life, 
And said, " In every moving form, 
With buoyant breath and pulses warm, 
In flowery crowns and veined leaves, 
A goddess dwells, whose bosom heaves 

With organizing strife." 

They looked and saw the billowy sea, 
With its boundless rush of waters free, 
Belting the firm earth, far and wide, 
With the flow of its deep, untainted tide ; 
. And wondering viewed, in its clear blue flood, 
A quick and scaly-glancing brood, . 
Sporting innumerous in the deep 
With dart, and plunge, and airy leap ; 
And said, '* Full sure a god doth reign 
King of this watery, wide domain, 
And rides in a car of cerulean hue 
O'er bounding billows of green and blue ; 
And in one hand a three-pronged spear 
He holds, the sceptre of his fear, 
And with the other shakes the reins 
Of his steeds, with foamy, flowing manes, 

And courses o'er the brine ; 
And when he lifts his trident mace, 
Broad Ocean crisps his darkling face, 

And mutters wrath divine ; 
The big waves rush with hissing crest, 
And beat the shore with ample breast, 

And shake the toppling cliff: . 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 31 

A wrathful god has roused the wave — 

Vain is all pilot's skill to save, 

And lo ! a deep, black-throated grave 

Ingulfs the reeling skiff." 
Anon the flood less fiercely flows, 
The rifted cloud blue ether shows, 

The vvindv buffets cease ; 
Poseidon 1 chafes his heart no more, 
His voice constrains the billows' roar, 

And men may sail in peace. 

In the old oak a Dryad dwelt ; 
The fingers of a nymph were felt 

In the fine-rippled flood ; 
At drowsy noon, when all was still, 
Faunus lay sleeping on the hill, 
And strange and bright-eyed gamesome creatures, 
With hairy limbs and goat-like features, 2 

Peered from the prickly wood. 

Thus every power that zones the sphere 
With forms of beauty and of fear, 
In starry sky, on grassy ground, 
And in the fishy brine profound, 
Were, to the hoar Pelasgic men 
That peopled erst each Grecian glen, 
Gods — or the actions of a god : 
Gods were in every sight and sound, 
And every spot was hallowed ground 
Where these far-wandering patriarchs trod. 

But all this fairy world lias passed away, to live only 
as shadows in the realms of fancy and of song. Schil- 
ler gives expression to the poet's lament in the follow- 
ing lines: 

1 Pos-ei'don, another name for Neptune, the sea-god. 2 The Sa'tyrs. 



32 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Art thou, fair world, no more ? 

Return, thou virgin-bloom on Nature's face ! 
Ah, only on the minstrel's magic shore 

Can we the footsteps of sweet Fable trace ! 
The meadows mourn for the old hallowing life ; 

Vainly we search the earth, of gods bereft ; 
"Where once the warm and living shapes were rife 

Shadows alone are left. 

The Latin poet Ov'id, who lived at the time of the 
Christian era, has collected from the fictions of the 
early Greeks and Oriental nations, and woven into one 
continuous history, the pagan accounts of the Creation, 
embracing a description of the primeval world, and the 
early changes it underwent, followed by a history of the 
four eras or ages of primitive mankind, the deluge of 
Deuca'lion, and then onward down to the time of Au- 
gustus Csesar. This great work of the pagan poet, 
called The Metamorphoses ', is not only the most curious 
and valuable record extant of ancient mythology, but 
some have thought they discovered, in every story it 
contains, a moral allegory ; while others have attempted 
to trace in it the whole history of the Old Testament, 
and types of the miracles and sufferings of our Saviour. 
But, however little of truth there may be in the last of 
these suppositions, the beautiful and impressive account 
of the Creation given by this poet, of the Four Ages of 
man's history which followed, and of the Deluge, coin- 
cides in so many remarkable respects with the Bible 
narrative, and with geological and other records, that 
we give it here as a specimen of Grecian fable that 
contains some traces of true history. The translation is 
by Dryden : 

Account of the Creation. 

Before the seas, and this terrestrial ball, 
And heaven's high canopy, that covers all, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 33 

One was the face of Nature — if a face — 
Rather, a rude and indigested mass ; 
A lifeless lump, unfashioned and unframed, 
Of jarring elements, and Chaos named. 

No sun was lighted up the world to view, 
Nor moon did yet her blunted horns renew, 
Nor yet was earth suspended in the sky, 
Nor, poised, did on her own foundations lie, 
Nor seas about the shores their arms had thrown ; 
But earth, and air, and water were in one. 
Thus air was void of light, and earth unstable, 
And water's dark abyss unnavigable. 
No certain form on any was impressed ; 
All were confused, and each disturbed the rest. 

Thus disembroiled they take their proper place ; 
The next of kin contiguously embrace, 
And foes are sundered by a larger space. 
The force of fire ascended first on hio-h. 
And took its dwelling in the vaulted sky ; 
Then air succeeds, in lightness next to fire, 
Whose atoms from inactive earth retire ; 
Earth sinks beneath and draws a numerous throng 
Of ponderous, thick, unwieldy seeds along. 
About her coasts unruly waters roar, 
And, rising on a ridge, insult the shore. 
Thus when the god — whatever god was he — 
Had formed the whole, and made the parts agree, 
That no unequal portions might be found, 
He moulded earth into a spacious round ; 
Then, with a breath, he gave the winds to blow, 
And bade the congregated waters flow. 
He adds the running springs and standing lakes, 
And bounding banks for winding rivers makes. 
Some parts in earth are swallowed up ; the most, 
In ample oceans disembogued, are lost. 

2* 



34 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

He shades the woods, the valleys he restrains 
With rocky mountains, and extends the plains. 

Then, every void of nature to supply, 

With forms of gods Jove fills the vacant sky ; 

New herds of beasts he sends the plains to share ; 

New colonies of birds to people air ; 

And to their oozy beds the finny fish repair. 

A creature of a more exalted kind 

Was wanting yet, and then was Man designed ; 

Conscious of thought, of more capacious breast, 

For empire formed and fit to rule the rest; 

Whether with particles of heavenly fire 

The God of nature did his soul inspire, 

Or earth, but new divided from the sky, 

And pliant, still retained the ethereal energy. 

Thus while the mute creation downward bend 

Their sight, and to their earthly mother tend, 

Man looks aloft, and with erected eyes 

Beholds his own hereditary skies. 

THE FOUR AGES OF MAS. 

The poet now describes the Ages, or various epochs in 
the civilization of the human race. The first is the Gold- 
en Age, a period of patriarchal simplicity, when Earth 
yielded her fruits spontaneously, and spring was eternal. 

The Golden Age was first, when man, yet new, 

No rule but uncorrnpted reason knew, 

And, with a native bent, did good pursue. 

Unforced by punishment, unawed by fear, 

His words were simple and his soul sincere; 

Needless were written laws where none oppressed ;. 

The law of man was written on his breast. 

No suppliant crowds before the judge appeared, 

No court erected yet, nor cause was heard, 

But all was safe, for conscience was their guard. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 35 

No walls were yet, nor fence, nor moat, nor mound ; 

Nor drum was heard, nor trumpet's angry sound; 

Nor swords were forged ; but, void of care and crime, 

The soft creation slept away their time. 

The teeming earth, yet guiltless of the plough, 

And unprovoked, did fruitful stores allow ; 

The flowers, unsown, in fields and meadows reigned, 

And western winds immortal spring maintained. 

The next, or the Silver Age, was marked by the 
change of seasons, and the division and cultivation of 
lands. 

Succeeding times a Silver Age behold, 
Excelling brass, but more excelled by gold. 
Then summer, autumn, winter did appear, 
And spring was but a season of the year ; 
The sun his annual course obliquely made, 
Good days contracted, and enlarged the bad. 
Then air with sultry heats began to glow, 
The wrings of wind were clogged with ice and snow; 
And shivering mortals, into houses driven, 
Sought shelter from the inclemency of heaven. 
Those houses then were caves or homely sheds, 
With twining osiers fenced, and moss their beds. 
Then ploughs for seed the fruitful furrows broke, 
And oxen labored first beneath the yoke. 

Then followed the Brazen Age, which was an epoch 
of war and violence. 

To this came next in course the Brazen Age; 
A warlike offspring, prompt to bloody rage, 
Not impious yet. 

According to He'siod, the next age is the Heroic, in 
which the world began to aspire toward better things; 
but Ovid omits this altogether, and gives, as the fourth 
and last, the Iron Age, also called the Plutonian Age, 



36 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

full of all sorts of hardships and wickedness. His de- 
scription of it is as follows : 

Hard steel succeeded then, 
And stubborn as the metal were the men. 
Truth, Modesty, and Shame the world forsook ; 
Fraud, Avarice, and Force their places took. 
Then sails were spread to every wind that blew ; 
Raw were the sailors, and the depths were new : 
Trees rudely hollowed did the waves sustain, 
Ere ships in triumph plough' d the watery plain. 
Then landmarks limited to each his right ; 
For all before was common as the light. 
Nor was the ground alone required to bear 
Her annual income to the crooked share ; 
But greedy mortals, rummaging her store, 
Digged from her entrails first the precious ore 
(Which next to hell the prudent gods had laid), 
And that alluring ill to sight displayed : 
Thus cursed steel, and more accursed gold, 
Gave mischief birth, and made that mischief bold ; 
And double death did wretched man invade, 
By steel assaulted, and by gold betrayed. 
Now (brandished weapons glittering in their hands) 
Mankind is broken loose from moral bands : 
No rights of hospitality remain ; 
The guest by him who harbored him is slain; 
The son-in-law pursues the father's life ; 
The wife her husband murders, he the wife ; 
The step-dame poison for the son prepares, 
The son inquires into his father's years. 
Faith flies, and Piety in exile mourns ; 
And Justice, here oppressed, to heaven returns. 

The Scriptures assert that the wickedness of mankind 
was the cause of the Noachian flood, or deluge. So, 
also, we find that, in Grecian mythology, like causes led 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 37 

to the deluge of Deucalion. Therefore, before giving 
Ovid's account of this latter event, we give, from He- 
siod, a curious account of 

THE ORIGIN OF EVIL, AND ITS INTRODUCTION INTO THE WORLD. 

It appears from the legend that, during a controversy 
between the gods and men, Pro-me'theus, 1 who is said 
to have surpassed all his fellow-men in intellectual vigor 
and sagacity, stole fire from the skies, and, concealing it 
in a hollow staff, brought it to man. Jupiter, angry at 
the theft of that which had been reserved from mortals 
for wise purposes, resolved to punish Prometheus, and 
through him all mankind, to show that it was not given 
to man to elude the wisdom of the gods. He therefore 
caused Yulcan to form an image of air and water to 
give it human voice and strength, and make it assume 
the form of a beautiful woman, like the immortal god- 
desses themselves. Minerva endowed this new creation 
with artistic skill, Venus gave her the witchery of 
beauty, Mercury inspired her with an artful disposi- 
tion, and the Graces added all their charms. But we 
append the following extracts from the beautifully writ- 
ten account by Hesiod, beginning with the command 
which Jupiter gave to Yulcan, the fire-god : 

Thus spoke the sire, whom heaven and earth obey, 
And bade the fire-god mould his plastic clay ; 
In-breathe the human voice within her breast ; 
With firm-strung nerves th' elastic limbs invest ; 
Her aspect fair as goddesses above — 
A virgin's likeness, with the brows of love. 

He bade Minerva teach the skill that dyes 
The wool with colors as the shuttle flies : 



1 In most Greek proper names ending in eus, the eus is pronounced in 
one syllable ; as Orpheus, pronounced Or'phuse. 



38 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN. HISTORY. 

He called the magic of Love's charming queen 
To breathe around a witchery of mien ; 
Then plant the rankling stings of keen desire 
And cares that trick the limbs with pranked attire : 
Bade Her'mes 1 last impart the craft refined 
Of thievish manners, and a shameless mind. 

He gives command — the inferior powers obey — 
The crippled artist 2 moulds the tempered clay : 
A maid's coy image rose at Jove's behest ; 
Minerva clasped the zone, diffused the vest ; 
Adored Persuasion and the Graces young 
Her tapered limbs with golden jewels hung ; 
Round her. smooth brow the beauteous-tressed Hours 
A garland twined of Spring's purpureal flowers. 

The whole attire Minerva's graceful art 
Disposed, adjusted, formed to every part; 
And last, the winged herald 3 of the skies, 
Slayer of Argus, gave the gift of lies- 
Gave trickish manners, honeyed "words instilled, 
As he that rolls the deepening thunder willed : 
Then by the feathered messenger of Heaven 
The name Pando'ra to the maid was given ; 
For ^11 the gods conferred a gifted grace 
To crown this mischief of the mortal race. 

Thus furnished, Pandora was brought as a gift from 
Jupiter to the dwelling of Ep-i-me'theus, the brother of 
Prometheus ; and the former, dazzled by her charms, 
received her in spite of the warnings of his sagacious 
brother, and made her his wife. 

The sire commands the winged herald bear 
The finished nymph, th' inextricable snare. 
To Epimetheus was the present brought : 
Prometheus' warning vanished from his thought — 

» Mercury. 2 Vulcan. . ? Mercury. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDAKY" PERIOD. 39 

That he disdain each offering of the skies. 
And straight restore, lest ill to man arise. 
But he received, and, conscious, knew too late 
Th' insidious gift, and felt the curse of fate. 

In the dwelling of Epimetheus stood a closed casket, 
which he had been forbidden to open; but Pandora, 
disregarding the injunction, raised the lid ; when lo ! to 
her consternation, all the evils hitherto unknown to 
mortals poured out, and spread themselves over the 
earth. In terror at the sight of these monsters, Pandora 
shut down the ]\d just .in time to prevent the escape 
of Hope, which thus remained to man, his chief support 
and consolation amid the trials of his pilgrimage. 

On earth, of yore, the sons of men abode 
From evil free, and labor's galling load ; 
Free from diseases that, with racking rao-e. 
Precipitate the pale decline of age. 
Now swift the days of manhood haste away, 
And misery's pressure turns the temples gray. 
The Woman's hands an ample casket bear; 
She lifts the lid — she scatters ill in air. 

Hope sole remained within, nor took her flight — 

Beneath the vessel's verge concealed from light ; 

Issued the rest, in quick dispersion hurled, 

And woes innumerous roamed the breathing world: 

With ills the land is full, with ills the sea ' { 

Diseases haunt our frail humanity ; 

Self-wandering through the noon, at night they glide 

Voiceless — a voice the power all-wise denied: 

Know, then, this awful truth : it is not given 

To elude the- wisdom of omniscient Heaven. 

Trans, by Elton. 

Professor Blackie has made this legend the subject 
of a pleasing poem, from which we take the following 

£3 



40 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

extracts, beginning with the acceptance by Epimetheus 
of the gift from Jupiter. The deluded mortal exclaims— 

" Bless thee, bless thee, gentle Hermes ! 

Once I sinned, and strove 
Vainly with my haughty brother 

'Gainst Olympian Jove. 
Now my doubts his love hath vanquished; 

Evil knows not he, 
Whose free-streaming grace prepared 

Such gift of gods for me. 
Henceforth I and fair Pandora, 

Joined in holy love, 
Only one in heaven will worship — 

Cloud-compelling Jove." 
Thus he ; and from the god received 

The glorious gift of Jove, 
And with fond embracement clasped her, 

Thrilled by potent love ; 
And in loving dalliance with her 

Lived from day to day, 
While her bounteous smiles diffusive 
Scared pale care away. 

By the mountain, by the river, 

'Neath the shaggy pine, 
By the cool and grassy fountain 

Where clear waters shine, 
He with her did lightly stray, 

Or softly did recline, 
Drinking sweet intoxication 

From that form divine. 

One day, when the moon had wheeled 

Four honeyed weeks away, 
From her chamber came Pandora 

Decked with trappings gay, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDAKY PERIOD. 41 

And before fond Epimetheus 

Fondly she did stand, 
A box all bright with lucid opal 

Holding in her hand. 

" Dainty box !" cried Epimetheus. 

" Dainty well may't be," 
Quoth Pandora — " curious Vulcan 

Framed it cunningly ; 
Jove bestowed it in my dowry : 

Like bright Phoebus' ray 
It shines without ; within, what wealth 

I know not to this day." 

It will be observed in what follows that the poet does 
not strictly adhere to the legend as given by Hesiod, 
in which it is stated that Pandora, probably under the 
influence of curiosity, herself raised the lid of the mys- 
terious casket. The poet, instead, attributes the act to 
Epimetheus, and so relieves Pandora of the odium and 
the guilt. 

" Let me see," quoth Epimetheus, 

" What my touch can do !" 
And swiftly to his finger's call 

The box wide open flew. 
O heaven ! O hell ! What Pandemonium 

In the pouncet dwells ! 
How it quakes, and how it quivers; 

How it seethes and swells ! 
Misty steams from it upwreathing, 

Wave on wave is spread ! 
Like a charnel-vault, 'tis breathing 

Vapors of the dead ! 
Fumes on fumes as from a throat 

Of sooty Vulcan rise, 
Clouds of red and blue and yellow 

Blotting the fair skies ! 



42 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

And the air, with noisome stenches, 

As from things that rot, 
Chokes the breather — exhalations 

From the infernal pot. 
And amid the thick-curled vapors 

Ghastly shapes I see 
Of dire diseases, Epimetheus, 

Launched on earth by thee. 
A horrid crew ! some lean and dwindled, 

Some with boils and blains 
Blistered, some with tumors swollen; 

And water in the veins; 
Some with purple blotches bloated, - 
Some with humors flowing 
- Putrid, some with creeping tetter 
Like a lichen growing 
O'er the dry skin, scaly-crusted; 

Some with twisted spine ' 
Dwarfing low with torture slow . 

The human form divine ; 
Limping some, some limbless lying; 

Fever, with frantic air, 
And pale consumption veiling death 
With looks serenely fair. 

All the troop of cureless evils, 

Rushing reinless forth 
From thv damned box, Pandora, 

Seize the tainted earth ! 
And to lay the marshalled legions 

Of our fiendish pains, 
Hope alone, a sorry charmer, 

In the box remains. 
Epimetheus knew the dolors, 

But he knew too late ; 
Jealous Jove himself, now vainly, 

Would revoke the fate. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 43 

And he cursed the fair Pandora, 

But he cursed in vain ; 
Still, to fools, the fleeting pleasure 
. Buys the lasting pain ! 

WHAT PROMETHEUS PERSONIFIED. 

Professor Blackie says, regarding Prometheus, that 
the common conception of him is, that he was the rep- 
resentative of freedom in contest with despotism. He 
thinks, however, that Goethe is nearer the depth of the 
myth when, in his beautiful lyric, he represents Prome- 
theus as the impersonation of that indefatigable en- 
durance in man which conquers the earth by skilful 
labor, in opposition to and despite those terrible influ- 
ences of the wild, elemental forces of Nature which the 
Greeks supposed were concentrated in the person of 
Jove. Accordingly, Pkofessor Blackie, in his Legend 
of Prometheus, represents him as proclaiming, in the 
following language, his empire on the earth, in opposi- 
tion to the powers above : 

"Jove rules above : Fate willed it so. 
Tis well ; Prometheus rules below. 
Their gusty games let wild winds play, 
And clouds on clouds in thick array 
Muster dark armies in the sky : 
Be mine a harsher trade to ply — 
This solid Earth, this rocky frame 
To mould, to conquer, and to tame — 
And to achieve the toilsome plan 
My workman shall be man. 

" The Earth is young. Even with these eyes 
I saw the molten mountains rise 
From out the seething deep, while Earth 
Shook at the portent of their birth. - 



44 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

I saw from out the primal mud 
The reptiles crawl, of dull, cold blood, 
While winged lizards, with broad stare, 
Peered through the raw and misty air. 
Where then was Cretan Jove ? Where then 
This king of gods and men ? 

" When, naked from his mother Earth, 
Weak and defenceless, man crept forth, 
And on mis-tempered solitude 
Of unploughed field and undipped wood 
Gazed rudely ; when, with brutes, he fed 
On acorns, and his stony bed 
In dark, unwholesome caverns found, 
No skill was then to tame the ground, 
No help came then from him above — 
This tyrannous, blustering Jove. 

" The Earth is young. Her latest birth, 
This weakling man, my craft shall girth 
With cunning strength. Him I will take, 
And in stern arts my scholar make. 
This smoking reed, in which I hold 
The empyrean spark, shall mould 
Rock and hard steel to use of man : 
He shall be as a god to plan 
And forge all things to his desire 
By alchemy of fire. 

" These jagged cliffs that flout the air, 
Harsh granite rocks, so rudely bare, 
Wise Vulcan's art and mine shall own 
To piles of shapeliest beauty grown. 
The steam that snorts vain strength away 
Shall serve the workman's curious sway, 
Like a wise child ; as clouds that sail 
White-winged before the summer gale, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 45 

The smoking chariot o'er the land 
Shall roll at his command. 

' Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks !' my home 
Stands firm beneath Jove's rattling dome, 
This stable Earth. Here let me work ! 
The busy spirits that eager lurk 
Within a thousand laboring breasts 
Here let me rouse ; and whoso rests 
From labor, let him rest from life. 
To 'live's to strive;' and in the strife 
To move the rock and stir the clod 
Man makes himself a god /" 

THE PUNISHMENT OF PROMETHEUS. 

Regarding the punishment of Prometheus for his dar- 
ing^ act, the legend states that Jupiter bound him with 
chains to a rock or pillar, supposed to be in Scythia, and 
sent an eagle to prey without ceasing on his liver, which 
grew every night as much as it had lost during the day. 
After an interval of thirty thousand years Hercules, a 
hero of great strength and courage, slew the eagle and 
set the sufferer free. The Greek poet ^Es'chylus, just- 
ly styled the father of Grecian tragedy, has made the 
punishment of Prometheus the basis of a drama, enti- 
tled Prometheus Bound, which many think is this po- 
et's masterpiece, and of which it has been remarked : 

" Nothing can be grander than the scenery in which 
the poet has made his hero suffer. He is chained to a 
desolate and stupendous rock at the extremity of earth's 
remotest wilds, frowning over old ocean. The daugh- 
ters of O-ce'a-nus, who constitute the chorus of the 
tragedy, come to comfort and calm him ; and even the 
aged Oceanus himself, and afterward Mercury, do all 
they can to persuade him to submit to his oppressor, 



46 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Jupiter. But all to no purpose; he sternly and tri- 
umphantly refuses. Meanwhile, the tempest rages, the 
lightnings flash upon the rock, the sands are torn up 
by whirlwinds, the seas are dashed against the sky, and 
all the artillery of heaven is levelled against his bosom, 
while he proudly defies the vengeance of his tyrant, and 
sinks into the earth to the lower regions, calling on the 
Powers of Justice to avenge his wrongs." 

In trying to persuade the defiant Prometheus to relent, 
^Eschylus represents Mercury as thus addressing him : 

" I have indeed, methinks, said much in vain, 

For still thy heart, beneath my showers of prayers, 

Lies dry and hard! nay, leaps like a young horse 

Who bites against the new bit in his teeth, 

And tugs and struggles against the new-tried rein, 

Still fiercest in the weakest thing of all, 

Which sophism is— for absolute will alone, 

When left to its motions in perverted minds, 

Is worse than null for strength ! Behold and see, 

Unless my words persuade thee, what a blast 

And whirlwind of inevitable woe 

Must sweep persuasion through thee ! For at first 

The Father will split up this jut of rock 

With the great thunder and the bolted flame, 

And hide thy body where the hinge of stone 

Shall catch it like an arm ! and when thou hast passed 

A long black time within, thou shalt come out 

To front the sun ; and Zeus's winged hound, 

The strong, carnivorous eagle, shall wheel down 

To meet thee— self-called to a daily feast— 

And set his fierce beak in thee, and tear off 

The long rags of thy flesh, and batten deep 

Upon thy dusky liver! 

" Do not look 
For any end, moreover, to this curse, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 47 

Or ere some god appear to bear thy pangs 
On his own head vicarious, and descend 
With unreluctant step the darks of hell, 
And the deep glooms enringing Tartarus ! 
Then ponder this : the threat is not a growth 
Of vain invention — it is spoken and meant ! 
For Zeus's mouth is impotent to lie, 
And doth complete the utterance in the act. 
So,, look to it, thou ! take heed ! and nevermore 
Forget good counsel to indulge self-will !" 

To which Prometheus answers as follows : 

" Unto me, the foreknower, this mandate of power, 

He cries, to reveal it ! 
And scarce strange is my fate, if I suffer from hate 

At the hour that I feel it ! 
Let the locks of the lightning, all bristling and whitening, 

Flash, coiling me round ! 
While the ether goes surging 'neath thunder and scourging 

Of wild winds unbound ! 
Let the blast of the firmament whirl from its place 

The earth rooted below — 
And the brine of the ocean, in rapid emotion, 

Be it driven in the face 
Of the stars up in heaven, as they walk to and fro ! 
Let him hurl me anon into Tartarus — on — 

To the blackest degree, 
With necessity's vortices strangling me down ! 
But he cannot join death to a fate meant for me!" 

Trans, by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 

THE SUFFERIXGS OF PROMETHEUS. 

We close this subject with a brief extract from the 
Prometheus Bound of the English poet Shelley, in 
which the sufferings of the defiant captive are vividly 
portrayed : 



48 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" No change, no pause, no hope ! yet I endure. 
I ask the Earth, have not the mountains felt ? 
I ask yon Heaven, the all-beholding Sun, 
Has it not seen ? The Sea, in storm or calm, 
Heaven's ever-changing shadow, spread below, 
Have its deaf waves not heard my agony % 
Ah me ! alas, pain, pain ever, forever ! 

"The crawling glaciers pierce me with the spears 
Of their moon-freezing crystals ; the bright chains 
Eat with their burning gold into my bones. 
Heaven's winged hound, polluting from thy lips 
His beak in poison not his own, tears up 
My heart ; and shapeless sights come wandering by — 
The ghastly people of the realm of dream . 
Mocking me ; and the Earthquake fiends are charged 
To wrench the rivets from my quivering wounds 
When the rocks split and close again behind ; 
While from their loud abysses howling throng 
The genii of the storm." 

Beturning now to the poet Ovid, we present the ac- 
count which he gives of the Deluge, or the destruction 
of mankind by a flood, called by the Greeks, 

THE DELUGE OF DEUCALION. 

Deucalion is represented as the son of Prometheus, 
and is styled the father of the Greek nation of post- 
diluvian times. When Jupiter determined to destroy 
the human race on account of its impiety, it was his 
first design, Ovid tells us, to accomplish it with fire. 
But his own safety demanded the employment of a less 
dangerous agency. 

Already had Jove tossed the flaming brand, 
And rolled the thunder in his spacious hand, 
Preparing to discharge on seas and land; 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 49 

But stopped, for fear, thus violently driven, 

The sparks should catch his axle-tree of heaven 

Remembering, in the Fates, a time when fire 
Should to the battlements of heaven aspire, 
And all his blazing worlds above should burn, 
And all the inferior globe to cinders turn. 
His dire artillery thus dismissed, he bent 
His thoughts to some securer punishment; 
Concludes to pour a watery deluge down, 
And what he durst not burn resolves to drown. 

In all this myth, it will be seen, Jupiter may very 
properly be considered as a personification of the ele- 
mental strife that drowned a guilty world. Deucalion, 
warned, by his father, of the coming deluge, thereupon 
made himself an ark or skiff, and, putting provisions 
into it, entered it with his wife, Pyrrha. The whole 
earth is then overspread with the flood of waters, and 
all animal life perishes, except Deucalion and his wife. 

The northern breath that freezes floods, Jove binds, 
With all the race of cloud-dispelling winds : 
The south he loosed, who night and horror brings, 
And fogs are shaken from his flaggy wino-s. 
From his divided beard two streams he pours ; 
His head and rheumy eyes distil in showers. 
The skies, from pole to pole, with peals resound ; 
And showers enlarged come pouring on the ground. 

Nor from his patrimonial heaven alone 
Is Jove content to pour his vengeance down : 
Aid from his brother of the seas he craves, 
To help him with auxiliary waves. 
The watery tyrant calls his brooks and floods, 
Who roll from mossy caves, their moist abodes, 
And with perpetual urns his palace fill ; 
To whom, in brief, he thus imparts his will : 

3 



50 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" Small exhortation needs ; your powers employ, 
And this bad world (so Jove requires) destroy. 
Let loose the reins to all your watery store ; 
Bear down the dams and open every door." 

The floods, by nature enemies to land, 
And proudly swelling with their new command, 
Remove the living stones that stopped their way, 
And, gushing from their source, augment the sea. 
Then with his mace their monarch struck the ground : 
With inward trembling Earth received the wound, 
And rising streams a ready passage found. 
The expanded waters gather on the plain, 
They float the fields and overtop the grain ; 
Then, rushing onward, with a sweepy sway, 
Bear flocks and folds and laboring hinds away. 
Nor safe their dwellings were; for, sapped by floods, 
Their houses fell upon their household gods. 
The solid hills, too strongly built to fall, 
High o'er their heads behold a watery wall. 
Now seas and earth were in confusion lost — 
A world of waters, and without a coast. 

One climbs a cliff ; one in his boat is borne, 
And ploughs above where late he sowed his corn. 
Others o'er chimney-tops and turrets row, 
And drop their anchors on the meads below ; 
Or, downward driven, they bruise the tender vine, 
Or, tossed aloft, are hurled against a pine. 
And where of late the kids had cropped the grass, 
The monsters of the deep now take their place. 
Insulting Ner'e-ids on the cities ride, 
And wondering dolphins o'er the palace glide. 
On leaves and masts of mighty oaks they browse, 
And their broad fins entangle in the boughs. 

The frighted wolf now swims among the sheep, 
The yellow lion wanders in the deep ; 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 51 

His rapid force no longer helps the boar, 
The stag swims faster than he ran before. 
The fowls, long beating on their wings in vain, 
Despair of land, and drop into the main. 
Now hills and vales no more distinction know, 
And levelled nature lies oppressed below. 
The most of mortals perished in the flood, 
The small remainder dies for want of food. 

Deucalion and Pyrrha were conveyed to the summit 
of Mount Parnassus, the highest mountain in Central 
Greece. According to Ovid, Deucalion now consulted 
the ancient oracle of Themis respecting the restora- 
tion of mankind, and received the following response : 
"Depart from the temple, veil your heads, loosen your 
girded vestments, and cast behind you the great bones 
of your parent." At length Deucalion discovered the 
meaning of the oracle — the bones being, by a very nat- 
ural figure, the stones, or rocky heights, of the earth. 
The poet then gives the following account of the abate- 
ment of the waters, and of the appearance of the earth : 

When Jupiter, surveying earth from high, 
Beheld it in a lake of water lie — 
That, where so many millions lately lived, 
But two, the best of either sex, survived — 
He loosed the northern wind : fierce Boreas flies 
To puff away the clouds and purge the skies : 
Serenely, while he blows, the vapors driven 
Discover heaven to earth and earth to heaven ; 
The billows fall while Neptune lays his mace 
On the rough sea, and smooths its furrowed face. 
Already Triton 1 at his call appears 
Above the waves : a Tyrian robe he wears, 
And in his hand a crooked trumpet bears. 



Son of Neptune. 



52 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The sovereign bids him peaceful sounds inspire, 
And give the waves the signal to retire. 
The waters, listening to the trumpet's roar, 
Obey the summons, and forsake the shore. 
A thin circumference of land appears, 
And Earth, but not at once, her visage rears, 
And peeps upon the seas from upper grounds : 
The streams, but just contained within their bounds, 
By slow degrees into their channels crawl, 
And earth increases as the waters fall : 
In longer time the tops of trees appear, 
Which mud on their dishonored branches bear. 
At length the world was all restored to view, 
But desolate, and of a sicklv hue: 
Nature beheld herself, and stood aghast, 
A dismal desert and a silent waste. 

When the waters had abated Deucalion left the rocky 
heights behind him, in obedience to the direction of the 
oracle, and went to dwell in the plains below. 

MORAL CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GODS, AND OF THEIR RULE 

OVER MANKIND. 

It is a prominent feature of the polytheistic system of 
the Greeks that the gods are represented as subject to 
all the passions and frailties of human nature. There 
were, indeed, among them personifications of good and 
of evil, as we see in A'te, the goddess of revenge or pun- 
ishment, and in the Erin'nys (or Furies), who avenge 
violations of filial duty, punish perjury, and are the 
maintainors of order both in the moral and the natu- 
ral world ; yet while these moral ideas restrained and 
checked men, the gods seem to have been almost 
wholly free from such control. " The society of Olym- 
pus, therefore," says Mahaffy, " is only an ideal Greek 
society in the lowest sense— the ideal of the school-boy 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 



53 



who thinks all control irksome, and its absence the 
greatest good — the ideal of a voluptuous man, who has 
strong passions, and longs for the power to indulge them 
without unpleasant consequences. It appears, there- 
fore, that the Homeric picture of Olympus is very val- 
uable, as disclosing to us the poet's notion of a society 
freed from the restraints of religion ; for the rhapso- 
dists 1 were dealing a death-blow (perhaps unconsciously) 
to the received religious belief by these very pictures 
of sin and crime among the gods. Their idea is a sort 
of semi-monarchical aristocracy, where a number of 
persons have the power to help favorites, and thwart 
the general progress of affairs; where love of faction 
overpowers every other consideration, and justifies vio- 
lence or deceit." 2 

Mr. Gladstone has given us, in the following ex- 
tract, his views of what he calls the " intense human- 
ity' of the Olympian system, drawn from what its 
great expounder has set forth in the Iliad and the 
Odyssey. "That system," he says, "exhibits a kind of 
royal or palace life of man, but on the one hand more 
splendid and powerful, on the other more intense and 
free. It is a wonderful and a gorgeous creation. It is 
eminently in accordance with the signification of the 
English epithet— rather a favorite, apparently, with our 
old writers— the epithet jovial, which is derived from 
the Latin name of its head. It is a life of all the 
pleasures of mind and body, of banquet and of revel, 
of music and of song ; a life in which solemn grandeur 
alternates with jest and gibe ; a life of childish wilful- 
ness and of fretfulness, combined with serious, manly, 
and imperial cares ; for the Olympus of Homer has at 



1 llhapsodist, a term applied to the reciters of Greek verse. 

2 " Social Life in Greece," by J. P. Mahaffy. 



54 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

least this one recommendation to esteem — that it is not 
peopled with the merely lazy and selfish gods of Epi- 
curus, but its inhabitants busily deliberate on the gov- 
ernment of man, and in their debates the cause of 

justice wins. 

"I do not now discuss the moral titles of the Olym- 
pian scheme ; what I dwell upon is its intense humanity, 
alike in its greatness and its littleness, its glory and its 
shame. As the cares and joys of human life, so the 
structure of society below is reflected, by the wayward 
wit of man, on heaven above. Though the names and 
fundamental traditions of the several deities were 
wholly or in great part imported from abroad, their 
characters, relations, and attributes passed under a 
Hellenizing process, which gradnally marked off for 
them special provinces and functions, according to laws 
which appear to have been mainly original and indig- 
enous, and to have been taken by analogy from the 
division of labor in political society. The Olympian 
society has its complement of officers and servants, with 
their proper functions. He-phses'tus (or Yulcan) moulds 
the twenty golden thrones which move automatically 
to form the circle of the council of the gods, and builds 
for each of his brother deities a separate palace in the 
deep-folded recesses of the mighty mountain. Mu- 
sic and song are supplied by Apollo and the Muses; 
Gan-y-me'de and He'be are the cup-bearers, Hermes 
and Iris are the messengers ; but Themis, in whom is 
impersonated the idea of deliberation and of relative 
rights, is the summoner of the Great Assembly of the 
gods in the Twentieth Iliad, when the great issue of the 
Trojan war is to be determined." ■ 

But, however prone the gods were to evil passions, 



Address to the Edinburgh University, November 3, 1865. 



• I 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 55 

and subject to human frailties, they were not believed 
to approve (in men) of the vices in which they them- 
selves indulged, but were, on the contrary, supposed to 
punish violations of justice and humanity, and to re? 
ward the brave and virtuous. We learn that they were 
to be appeased by libations and sacrifice ; and their aid, 
not only in great undertakings, but in the common affairs 
of life, was to be obtained by prayer and supplication. 
For instance, in the Ninth Book of Homer's Iliad the 
aged Phce'nix — warrior and sage — in a beautiful alle- 
gory personifying " Offence " and " Prayers," represents 
the former as robust and fleet of limb, outstripping the 
latter, and hence roaming over the earth and doing im- 
mense injury to mankind ; but the Prayers, following 
after, intercede with Jupiter, and, if we avail ourselves 
of them, repair the evil ; but if we neglect them we 
are told that the vengeance of the wrong shall overtake 
us. Thus, Phoenix says of the gods, 

" If a mortal man 
Offend them by transgression of their laws, 
Libation, incense, sacrifice, and prayer, 
In meekness offered, turn their wrath away. 

Prayers are Jove's daughters, 
Which, though far distant, yet with constant pace 
Follow Offence. Offence, robust of limb, 
And treading firm the ground, outstrips them all, 
And over all the earth before them runs, 
Hurtful to man. Thev, following, heal the hurt. 
Received respectfully when they approach, 
They yield us aid and listen when we pray ; 
But if we slight, and with obdurate heart 
Resist them, to Saturn ian Jove they cry 
Against us, supplicating that Offence 
May cleave to us for vengeance of the wrong." 

Cowper's Trans. 



56 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

In the Seventeenth Book, Men-e-la'us is represented 
going into battle, "supplicating, first, the sire of all" — 
'that is, Jupiter, the king of the gods. In the Twenty- 
third Book, Antil'ockns attributes the ill-success of Eu- 
me'lus in the chariot-race to his neglect of prayer. He 
says, 

" He should have offered prayer ; then had he not 
Arrived, as now, the hindmost of us all." 

Numerous other instances might be given, from the 
works of the Grecian poets, of the supposed efficacy of 
prayer to the gods. 

The views of the early Greeks respecting the dispen- 
sations of an overruling Providence, as shown in their 
belief in retributive justice, are especially prominent in 
some of the sublime choruses of the Greek tragedians, 
and in the Works and Days of Hesiod. For instance, 
iEschylus says, 

The ruthless and oppressive power 
May triumph for its little hour; 

But soon, with all their vengeful train, 
The sullen Furies rise, 

Break his full force, and whirl him down 

Thro' life's dark paths, nnpitied and unknown. 

Potter's Trans. 

The following extracts from Hesiod illustrate the cer- 
tainty with which Justice was believed to overtake and 
punish those who pervert her ways, while the good are 
followed by blessings. They also show that the crimes 
of one are often " visited on all." 

Earth's crooked judges— lo ! the oath's dread god 
Avenging runs, and tracks them where they trod. 
Rough are the ways of Justice as the sea, 
Dragged to and fro by men's corrupt decree ; 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 

Bribe-pampered men ! whose hands, perverting, draw 
The right aside, and warp the wrested law. 

Though while Corruption on their sentence waits 
They thrust pale Justice from their haughty gates, 
Invisible their steps the Virgin treads, 
And musters evil o'er their sinful heads. 
She with the dark of air her form arrays, 
And walks in awful grief the city ways : 
Her wail is heard ; her tear, upbraiding, falls 
O'er their stained manners and devoted walls. 

But they who never from the right have strayed — 
"Who as the citizen the stranger aid — 
They and their cities flourish : genial peace 
Dwells in their borders, and their youth increase;. 
Nor Jove, whose radiant eyes behold afar, 
Hangs forth in heaven the signs of grievous war ; 
Nor scath, nor famine, on the righteous prey — 
Peace crowns the night, and plenty cheers the day. 
Rich are their mountain oaks : the topmost tree 
The acorns fill, its trunk the hiving bee ; 
Their sheep with fleeces pant ; their women's race 
Reflect both parents in the infant face : 
Still flourish they, nor tempt with ships the main; 
The fruits of earth are poured from every plain. 

But o'er the wicked race, to whom belong 
The thought of evil and the deed of wrong, 
Saturnian Jove, of wide-beholding eyes, 
Bids the dark signs of retribution rise ; 
And oft the deeds of one destructive fall — 
The crimes of one — are visited on all. 
The god sends down his angry plagues from high- 
Famine and pestilence — in heaps they die I 
Again, in vengeance of his wrath, he falls 
On their great hosts, and breaks their tottering walls ; 

3* 



57 



58 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Scatters their ships of war ; and where the sea 
Heaves high its mountain billows, there is he ! 

Ponder, judges ! in your inmost thought 

The retribution by his vengeance wrought. 

Invisible, the gods are ever nigh, 

Pass through the midst, and bend th' all-seeing eye. 

The man who grinds the poor, who wrests the right, 

Aweless of Heaven, stands naked to their sight : 

For thrice ten thousand holy spirits rove 

This breathing world, the delegates of Jove ; 

Guardians of man, their glance alike surveys 

The upright judgments and the unrighteous ways. 

A virgin pure is Justice, and her birth 

August from him who rules the heavens and earth — 

A creature glorious to the gods on high, 

Whose mansion is yon everlasting sky. 

Driven by despiteful wrong she takes her seat, 

In lowly grief, at Jove's eternal feet. 

There of the soul unjust her plaints ascend : 

So rue the nations when their kings offend — 

When, uttering wiles and brooding thoughts of ill, 

They bend the laws, and wrest them to their will. 

Oh ! gorged with gold, ye kingly judges, hear ! 

Make straight your paths, your crooked judgments fear, 

That the foul record may no more be seen — 

Erased, forgot, as though it ne'er had been. 

Trans, ty Elton. 

OATHS. 

As in the beginning of the foregoing extract, so the 
poets frequently refer to the oaths that were taken by 
those who entered into important compacts, showing 
that then as now, and as in Old Testament times, some 
overruling deity was invoked to witness the agreement 
or promise, and punish its violation. Sometimes the per- 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 59 

son touched the altar of the god by whom he swore, or 
the blood that was shed in the ceremonial sacrifice, while 
some walked through the fire to sanctify their oaths. 
When Abraham sware unto the King of Sodom that he 
would not enrich himself with any of the king's goods, 
he lifted up his hand to heaven, pointing to the sup- 
posed residence of the Deity, as if calling on him to 
witness the oath. When he requires his servant to take 
an oath unto him he says, "Put, I pray thee, thy hand 
under my thigh : and I will make thee swear by the 
Lord, the God of heaven and earth ;" and Jacob requires 
the same ceremony from Joseph when the latter prom- 
ises to carry his father's bones up out of Egypt. 

When the goddess Yesta swore an oath in the very 
presence of Jupiter, as represented in Homer's hymn, 
she touched his head, as the most fitting ceremonial. 

Touching the head of iEgis-bearing Jove, 
A mighty oath she swore, and hath fulfilled, 
That she among the goddesses of heaven 
Would still a virgin be. 

We find a military oath described by iEschylns in the 
drama of The Seven Chiefs against Thebes : 

O'er the hollow of a brazen shield 

A bull they slew, and, touching with their hands 

The sacrificial stream, they called aloud 

On Mars, Eny'o, and blood-thirsty Fear, 

And swore an oath or in the dust to lay 

These walls, and give our people to the sword, 

Or, perishing, to steep the land in blood ! 

That there was sometimes a fire ordeal to sanctify 
the oath, we learn from the Antig'o-ne of Sophocles. 
The Messenger who brought tidings of the burial of 
Polyni'ces says, 



60 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" Keady were we to grasp the burning steel, 
To pass through fire, and by the gods to swear 
The deed was none of ours, nor aught we knew 
Of living man by whom 'twas planned or done." 

In the Twelfth Book of Vikgil's JEne'id, when King 
Turnus enters into a treaty with the Trojans, he touches 
the altars of his gods and the flames, as part of the 
ceremony : 

" I touch the sacred altars, touch the flames, 
And all these powers attest, and all their names, 
Whatever chance befall on either side, 
No term of time this union shall divide ; 
No force nor fortune shall my vows unbind, 
To shake the steadfast tenor of my mind." 

The ancient poets and orators denounce perjury in the 
strongest terms, and speak of the offence as' one of a 
most odious character. 

THE FUTURE STATE. 

The future state in which the Greeks believed was 
to some extent one of rewards and punishments. The 
souls of most of the dead, however, were supposed to 
descend to the realms of Ha'des, where they remained, 
joyless phantoms, the mere shadows of their former 
selves, destitute of mental vigor, and, like the spectres 
of the North American Indians, pursuing, with dream- 
like vacancy, the empty images of their past occupa- 
tions and enjoyments. So cheerless is the twilight of 
the nether world that the ghost of Achilles informs 
Ulysses that it would rather live the meanest hireling 
on earth than be doomed to continue in the shades 
below, even though as sovereign ruler there. Thus 
Achilles asks him — 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 61 

" How hast thou dared descend into the gloom 
Of Hades, where the shadows of the dead, 
Forms without intellect, alone reside?" 

And when Ulysses tries to console him by reminding 
him that he was even there supreme over all his fellow- 
shades, he receives this reply : 

" Renowned Ulysses ! think not death a theme 

Of consolation : I would rather live 

The servile hind for hire, and eat the bread 

Of some man scantily himself sustained, 

Than sovereign empire hold o'er all the shades." 

Odyssey, by Cowper, B. XI. 

But even in Hades a distinction is made between the 
good and the bad, for there Ulysses finds Mi'nos, the 
early law-giver of Crete, advanced to the position of 
judge over the assembled shades — absolving the just, 
and condemning the guilty. 

High on a throne, tremendous to behold, 
Stern Minos waves a mace of burnished gold ; 
Around, ten thousand thousand spectres stand, 
Through the wide dome of Dis, a trembling band ; 
Whilst, as they plead, the fatal lots he rolls, 
Absolves the just, and dooms the guilty souls. 

Odyssey, by Pope, B. XL 

The kinds of punishment inflicted here are, as might 
be expected, wholly earthly in their nature, and may be 
regarded rather as the reflection of human passions than 
as moral retributions by the gods. Thus, Tan'talus, 
placed up to his chin in water, which ever flowed away 
from his lips, was tormented with unquenchable thirst, 
while the fruits hanging around him constantly eluded 
his grasp. The story of Tantalus is well told by Pro- 
fessor Blackie, as follows : 



62 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Tantalus. 









O Tantalus ! thou wert a man 
More blest than all since earth began 

Its weary round to travel ; 
But, placed in Paradise, like Eve, 
Thine own damnation thou didst weave, 

Without help from the devil. 
Alas ! I fear thy tale to tell ; 
Thou'rt in the deepest pool of hell, 

And shalt be there forever. 
For why ? When thou on lofty seat 
Didst sit, and eat immortal meat 

With Jove, the bounteous Giver, 
The gods before thee loosed their tongue, 
And many a mirthful ballad sung, 
And all their secrets open flung 

Into thy mortal ear. 

The poet then goes on to describe the gossip, and 
pleasures, and jealousies, and scandals of Olympus 
which Tantalus heard and witnessed, and then proceeds 
as follows : 

But witless he such grace to prize ; 

And, with licentious babble, 
He blazed the secrets of the skies 

Through all the human rabble, 
And fed the greed of tattlers vain 

With high celestial scandal, 
And lent to every eager brain 

And wanton tongue a handle 
Against the gods. For which great sin, 

By righteous Jove's command, 
In hell's black pool up to the chin 

The thirsty king doth stand : 
With parched throat he longs to drink, 

But when he bends to sip, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 63 

The envious waves receding sink, 
And cheat his pining lip. 

Like in character was the punishment inflicted upon 
Sis'y-phus, " the most crafty of men," as Homer calls 
him. Being condemned to roll a huge stone up a hill, 
it proved to be a never-ending, still-beginning toil, for 
as soon as the stone reached the summit it rolled down 
again into the plain. So, also, Ix-i'on, "the Cain of 
Greece," as he is expressly called — the first shedder of 
kindred blood — was doomed to be fastened, with brazen 
bands, to an ever-revolving fiery wheel. But the very 
refinement of torment, similar to that inflicted upon 
Prometheus, was that suffered by the giant Tit'y-us, 
who was placed on his back, while vultures constantly 
fed upon his liver, which grew again as fast as it was 
eaten. 

THE DESCENT OF OR'PHEUS. 

Only once do we learn that these torments ceased, 
and that was when the musician Orpheus, lyre in hand, 
descended to the lower world to reclaim his beloved 
wife, the lost Eu-ryd'i-ce. At the music of his "golden 
shell" Tantalus forgot his thirst, Sisyphus rested from 
his toil, the wheel of Ixion stood still, and Tityus ceased 
his moaning. The poet Ovid thus describes the won- 
derful effects of the musician's skill : 

The very bloodless shades attention keep, 

And, silent, seem compassionate to weep ; 

Even Tantalus his flood unthirsty views, 

Nor flies the stream, nor he the stream pursues : 

Ixion's wondrous wheel its whirl suspends, 

And the voracious vulture, charmed, attends ; 

No more the Bel'i-des their toil bemoan, 

And Sisyphus, reclined, sits listening on the stone. 

Trans, by Congreve. 



64 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Pope's translation of this scene from the Iliad is 
peculiarly melodious : 

But when, through all the infernal bounds 

Which flaming Phleg'e-thon surrounds, 

Love, strong as death, the poet led 

To the pale nations of the dead, 

What sounds were heard, 

What scenes appeared, 

O'er all the dreary coasts ! 

Dreadful gleams, 

Dismal screams, 

Fires that glow, 

Shrieks of woe, 

Sullen moans, 

Hollow groans, 

And cries of tortured ghosts ] 

But hark ! he strikes the golden lyre ; 

And see ! the tortured ghosts respire ! 

See ! shady forms advance ! 

Thy stone, O Sisyphus, stands still, 

Ixion rests upon his wheel, 

And the pale spectres dance ; 

The Furies sink upon their iron beds, 

And snakes uncurled hang listening round their heads. 

The Greeks also believed in an Elys'ium— some dis- 
tant island of the ocean, ever cooled by refreshing 
breezes, and where spring perpetual reigned— to which, 
after death, the blessed were conveyed, and where they 
were permitted to enjoy a happy destiny. In the Fourth 
Book of the Odyssey the sea god Pro'teus, in predict- 
ing for Menelaus a happier lot than that of Hades, 
thus describes the Elysian plains: 

But oh ! beloved of Heaven ! reserved for thee 
A happier lot the smiling Fates decree : 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 65 

Free from that law beneath whose mortal sway- 
Matter is changed and varying forms decay, 
Elysium shall be thine — the blissful plains 
Of utmost earth, where Rbadaman'thus reigns. 
Joys ever young, unmixed with pain or fear, 
Fill the wide circle* of the eternal year. 
Stern Winter smiles on that auspicious clime ; 
The fields are florid with unfadiug prime ; 
From the bleak pole no winds inclement blow, 
Mould the round hail, or flake the fleecy snow ; 
But from the breezy deep the blest inhale 
The fragrant murmurs of the western gale. 

Pope's Trans. 

Similar views are expressed by the lyric poet Pindar 
in the following lines : 

All whose steadfast virtue thrice 

Each side the grave unchanged hath stood, 
Still unseduced, unstained with vice — 

They, by Jove's mysterious road, 
Pass to Saturn's realm of rest — 
Happy isle, that holds the blest; 
Where sea-born breezes gently blow 
O'er blooms of gold that round them glow, 
Which Nature, boon from stream or strand 

Or goodly tree, profusely showers ; 
Whence pluck they many a fragrant band, 

And braid their locks with never-fadino- flowers. 

Trans, by A. Moore. 

There is so much similarity between the mythology 
of the early Greeks and that of many of the Asiatic 
nations, that we give place here to the supposed medi- 
tations of a Hindoo prince and sceptic on the great 
subject of a future state of existence, as a fitting close 
of our brief review of the religious beliefs of the an- 
cients. Among the Asiatic nations are to be found 



66 . MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

accounts of the Creation, and of multitudes of gods, 
good and evil, all quite as pronounced as those that are 
derived from the Grecian myths ; and while the wild- 
est and grossest of superstitious fancies have prevailed 
among the common people, scepticism and atheistic 
doubt are known to have been nearly universal among 
the learned. The poem which we give in this connec- 
tion, therefore, though professedly a Hindoo creation, 
may be accepted not only as portraying Hindoo doubt 
and despondency, but also as a faithful picture of the 
anxiety, doubt, and almost utter despair, not only of the 
ancient Greeks, but of the entire heathen world, con- 
cerning the destiny of mankind. 

The Hindoo sceptic tells us that ever since mankind 
began their race on this earth they have been seeking 
for the " signs and steps of a God ;" and that in mys- 
tical India, where the deities hover and swarm, and a 
million shrines stand open, with their myriad idols and 
legions of muttering priests, mankind are still groping 
in darkness; still listening, and as yet vainly hoping 
for a message that shall, tell what the wonders of crea- 
tion mean, and whither they tend ; ever vainly seeking 
for a refuge from the ills of life, and a rest beyond for 
the weary and heavy-laden. He turns to the deified 
heroes of his race, and though long he watches and 
worships for a solution of the mysteries of life, he waits 
in vain for an answer, for their marble features never 
relax in response to his prayers and entreaties ; and he 
says, mournfully, " Alas ! for the gods are dumb." The 
darts of death still fall as surely as ever, hurled by a 
Power unseen and a hand unknown ; and beyond the 
veil all is obscurity and gloom. 

i. 
All the world over, I wonder, in lands that I never have trod, 
Are the people eternally seeking for the signs and steps of a God? 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 



67 



Westward across the ocean, and, northward beyond the snow, 
Do they all stand gazing, as ever? and what do the wisest know ? 

ii. 
Here, in this mystical India, the deities hover and swarm 
Like the wild bees heard in the tree-tops, or the gusts of a 

Catherines storm ; 
In the air men hear their voices, their feet on the rocks are 

seen, 
Yet we all say, " Whence is the message — and what may the 
wonders mean ?" 

in. 

A million shrines stand open, and ever the censer swings, 

As they bow to a mystic symbol or the figures of ancient kings ; 

And the incense rises ever, and rises the endless cry 

Of those who are heavy-laden, and of cowards loath to die. 

IV. 

For the destiny drives us together like deer in a pass of the 

hills: 
Above is the sky, and around us the sound and the shot that 

kills. 
Pushed by a Power we see not, and struck by a hand unknown, 
We pray to the trees for shelter, and press our lips to a stone. 

v. 

The trees wave a shadowy answer, and the rock frowns hollow 

and grim, 
And the form and the nod of the demon are caught in the 

twilight dim ; 
And we look to the sunlight falling afar on the mountain crest — 
Is there never a path runs upward to a refuge there and a rest? 



VI. 



The path— ah, who has shown it, and which is the faithful guide? 
The haven— ah, who has known it? for steep is the mountain- 
side. 



68 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

For ever the shot strikes surely, and ever the wasted breath 
Of the praying multitude rises, whose answer is only death! 

VII. 

Here are the tombs of my kinsfolk, the first of an ancient name — 
Chiefs who were slain on the war-field, and women who died in 

flame. 
They are gods, these kings of the foretime, they are spirits who 

guard our race : 
Ever I watch and worship — they sit with a marble face. 

VIII. 

And the myriad idols around me, and the legion of muttering 
priests — 

The revels and rites unholy, the dark, unspeakable feasts— 

What have they wrung from the silence ? Hath even a whis- 
per come 

Of the secret— whence and whither ? Alas ! for the gods are 
dumb. 

Getting no light from the religions guides of his own 
country, he turns to the land where the English— the 
present rulers of India— dwell, and asks, 

IX. 

Shall I list to the word of the English, who come from the 

uttermost sea? 
" The secret, hath it been told you ? and what is your message 

to me?" 
It is naught but the wide-world story, how the earth and the 

heavens began — 
How the gods are glad and angry, and a deity once was man. 

And so he gathers around him the mantle of doubt 
and despondency ; he asks if life is, after all, but a dream 
and delusion, while ever and ever is forced upon him 
that other question, " Where shall the dreamer awake f' 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 



69 



x. 

I had thought, "Perchance in the cities where the rulers of 

India dwell, 
Whose orders flash from the far land, who girdle the earth with 

a spell, 
They have fathomed the depths we float on, or measured the 

unknown main — " 
Sadly they turn from the venture, and say that the quest is 

vain. 

XI. 

Is life, then, a dream and delusion ? and where shall the dreamer 

awake ? 
Is the world seen like shadows on water? and what if the mirror 

break ? 
Shall it pass as a camp that is struck, as a tent that is gathered 

and gone 
From the sands that were lamp-lit at eve, and at morning are 

level and lone ? 

XII. 

Is there naught in the heaven above, whence the hail and the 

levin are hurled, 
But the wind that is swept around us by the rush of the rolling 

world — 
The wind that shall scatter my ashes, and bear me to silence 

and sleep, 
With the dirge and the sounds of lamenting, and voices of 

women who weep ? The Comhill Magazine. 



What a commentary on all this doubt and despondency 
are the meditations of the Christian, who, "sustained 
and soothed by an unfaltering trust," approaches his 
grave 

Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams ! 

Bryant. 



70 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

II. THE EARLIEST INHABITANTS OF GREECE. 

The earliest reliable information that we possess of 
the country called Greece represents it in the possession 
of a number of rude tribes, of which the Pelas'gians 
were the most numerous and powerful, and probably 
the most ancient. Of the early character of the Pelas- 
gians, and of the degree of civilization to which they 
had attained before the reputed founding of Argos, we 
have unsatisfactory and conflicting accounts. On the 
one hand, they are represented as no better than the 
rudest barbarians, dwelling in caves, subsisting on rep- 
tiles, herbs, and wild fruits, and strangers to the sim- 
plest arts of civilized life. Other and more reliable 
traditions, however, attribute to them a knowledge of 
agriculture, and some little acquaintance with naviga- 
tion ; while there is a strong probability that they were 
the authors of those huge structures commonly called 
Cyclopean, remains of which are still visible in many 
parts of Greece and Italy, and on the western coast of 

Asia Minor. 

Argos, the capital of Ar'golis, is generally considered 
the most ancient city of Greece; and its reputed found- 
ing by In'achus, a son of the god O-ce'anus, 1856 years 
before the Christian era, is usually assigned as the period 
of the commencement of Grecian history. But the mas- 
sive Cyclopean walls of Argos evidently show the Pelas- 
gic origin of the place, in opposition to the traditionary 
Phcenician origin of Inachus, whose very existence is 
quite problematical. Indeed, although many of the tra- 
ditions of the Greeks point to a contrary conclusion, 
the accounts usually given of early foreign settlers in 
Greece, who planted colonies there, founded dynasties, 
built cities, and introduced a knowledge of the arts un- 
known to the ruder natives, must be taken with a great 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 71 

degree of abatement. The civilization of the Greeks 
and the development of their language bear all the 
marks of home growth, and probably were little affected 
by foreign influence. Still, many of these traditions are 
exceedingly interesting, and have attained great celeb- 
rity. One of the most celebrated is that which describes 
the founding of Athens, one of the renowned Grecian 
cities. 

THE FOUNDING OF ATHENS. 

Ce'crops, an Egyptian, is said to have led a colony 
from the Delta to Greece, about the year 1556 b.c. 
Two years later he proceeded to Attica, which had been 
desolated by a deluge a century before, and there he is 
said to have founded, on the Cecropian rock — the Acrop'- 
olis — a city which, under the following circumstances, he 
called Athens, in honor of the Grecian goddess Athe'na, 
whom the Romans called Minerva. 

It is an ancient Attic legend that about this time 
the gods had begun to choose favorite spots among the 
dwellings of man for their own residence; and what- 
ever city a god chose, he gave to that city protection, 
and there that particular deity was worshipped with 
special homage. Now, it happened that both Neptune 
and Minerva contended for the supremacy over this new 
city founded by Cecrops ; and Cecrops was greatly trou- 
bled by the contest, as he knew not to which deity to 
render homage. So Jove summoned a council of the 
gods, and they decided that the supremacy should be 
given to the one who should confer the greatest gift 
upon the favored city. The story of the contest is told 
by Professor Blackie in the following verses. 

Mercury, the messenger of the gods, being sent to 
Cecrops, thus announces to him the decision of the 
council : 



72 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" On the peaks of Olympus, the bright snowy-crested, 

The gods are assembled in council to-day, 
The wrath of Pos-ei'don, the mighty broad-breasted, 

* 'Gainst Pallas, the spear-shaking maid, to allay. 
And thus they decree — that Poseidon offended 

And Pallas shall bring forth a gift to the place : 
On the hill of Erech'theus the strife shall be ended, 

When she with her spear, and the god with his mace, 
Shall strike the quick rock ; and the gods shall deliver 

The sentence as Justice shall order ; and thou 
Shalt see thy loved city established forever, 

With Jove for a judge, and the Styx for a vow." 

So the gods assembled, in the presence of Cecrops 
himself, on the "hill of Erechtheus" — afterward known 
as the Athenian Acropolis— to witness the trial between 
the rival deities, as described in the following language. 
First, Neptune strikes the rock with his trident : 

Lo ! at the touch of his trident a wonder ! 

Virtue to earth from his deity flows ; 
From the rift of the flinty rock, cloven asunder, 
• A dark-watered fountain ebullient rose, 
Inlv elastic, with airiest lightness 

It leapt, till it cheated the eyesight ; and, lo ! 
It showed in the sun, with a various brightness, 

The fine-woven hues of the heavenly bow. 
" Water is best !" cried the mighty, broad-breasted 

Poseidon ; " O Cecrops, I offer to thee 
To ride on the back of the steeds foamy-crested 

That toss their wild manes on the huge-heaving sea. 
The globe thou shalt mete on the path of the waters, 

To thy ships shall the ports of far ocean be free ; 
The isles of the sea shall be counted thy daughters, 

The pearls of the East shall be gathered for thee !" 

Thus Neptune offered, as his gift— symbolized in the 
salt spring that lie caused to issue from the rock— the 






THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 73 



dominion of the sea, with all the wealth and renown that | 

flow from unrestricted commerce with foreign lands. 
But Minerva was now to make her trial : 

Then the gods, with a high-sounding pa3an, 

Applauded ; but Jove hushed the many-voiced tide ; 
" For now with the lord of the brinv -£Wan 

Athe'na shall strive for the city," he cried. 
" See where she comes !" and she came, like Apollo, 

Serene with the beauty ripe wisdom confers ; 
The clear-scanning eye, and the sure hand to follow 

The mark of the far-sighted purpose, were hers. 
Strong in the mail of her father she standeth, 

And firmly she holds the strong spear in her hand ; 
But the wild hounds of war with calm power she commandeth, 

And fights but to pledge surer peace to the land. 
Chastely the blue-eyed approached, and, surveying 

The council of wise-judging gods without fear, 
The nod of her lofty-throned father obeying, 

She struck the gray rock with her nice-tempered spear. 
Lo ! from the touch of the virgin a wonder ! 

Virtue to earth from her deity flows : 
From the rift of the flinty rock, cloven asunder, 

An olive-tree, greenly luxuriant, rose — 
Green but yet pale, like an eye-drooping maiden, 

Gentle, from full-blooded lustihood far ; 
• No broad-staring hues for rude pride to parade in, 

No crimson to blazon the banners of war. 

Mutely the gods, with a calm consultation, 

Pondered the fountain and pondered the tree; 
And the heart of Poseidon, with high expectation, 

Throbbed till great Jove thus pronounced the decree : 
" Son of my father, thou mighty, broad-breasted 

Poseidon, the doom that I utter is true ; 
Great is the might of thy waves foamy-crested 

When they beat the white walls of the screaming sea-mew ; 

4 



74 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Great is the pride of the keel when it danceth, 

Laden with wealth, o'er the light-heaving wave- 
When the East to the West, gayly floated, advanceth, 

With a word from the wise and a help from the brave. 
But earth — solid earth — is the home of the mortal 

That toileth to live, and that liveth to toil ; 
And the green olive-tree twines the wreath of his portal 

Who peacefully wins his sure bread from the soil." 
Thus Jove: and to heaven the council celestial 

Rose, and the sea-god rolled back to the sea ; 
But Athena gave Athens her name, and terrestrial 

Joy from the oil of the green olive-tree. 

Thus Jove decided in favor of the peaceful pursuits 
of industry on the land, as against the more alluring 
promises but uncertain results of commerce, thereby 
teaching this lesson in political economy— that a people 
consisting of mere merchants, and neglecting the culti- 
vation of the soil, never can become a great and power- 
ful nation. So Minerva, the goddess of wisdom, and 
patroness of all the liberal arts and sciences, became the 
tutelary deity of Athens. The contest between her and 
Neptune was represented on one of the pediments of 

the Parthenon. 

Of the history of Athens for many centuries subse- 
quent to its alleged founding by Cecrops. we have no 
certain information; but it is probable that down to 
about 683 b.c. it was ruled by kings, like all the other 
Grecian states. Of these kings the names of The'sens 
and Co'drus are the most noted. To the former is as- 
cribed the union of the twelve states of Attica into one 
political body, with Athens as the capital, and other im- 
portant acts of government which won for him the love 
of the Athenian people. Consulting the oracle of Delphi 
concerning his new government, he is said to have re- 
ceived the following answer : 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 75 

From royal stems thy honor, Theseus, springs; 

By Jove beloved, the sire supreme of kings. 

See rising towns, see wide-extended states, 

On thee dependent, ask their future fates ! 

Hence, hence with fear ! Thy favored bark shall ride 

Safe o'er the surges of the foamy tide. 



About half a century after the time of Cecrops an- 
other Egyptian, named Dan'a-us, is said to have fled to 
Greece, with a family of fifty daughters, and to have 
established a second Egyptian colony in the vicinity of 
Argos. He subsequently became king of Argos, and 
the inhabitants were called Dan'a-i. About the same 
time Cadmus, a Phoenician, is reported to have led a 
colony into Bceo'tia, bringing with him the Phoenician 
alphabet, the basis of the Grecian, and to have founded 
Cadme'a, which afterward became the citadel of Thebes. 
Another colony is said to have been led from Asia by 
Pe'lops, from whom the southern peninsula of Greece 
derived its name of Peloponne'sus, and of whom Aga- 
memnon, King of Myce'nas, was a lineal descendant. 
About this time a people called the Helle'nes— but wheth- 
er a Pelasgic tribe or otherwise is uncertain— first ap- 
peared in the south of Thessaly, and, gradually diffusing 
themselves over the whole country, became, by their 
martial spirit and active, enterprising genius, the ruling 
class, and impressed new features upon the Grecian char- 
acter. The Hellenes gave their name to the population 
of the whole peninsula, although the term Grecians was 
subsequently applied to them by the Romans. 

In accordance with the Greek custom of attributing 
the origin of their tribes or nations to some remote 
mythical ancestor, Hel'len, a son of the fabulous Deu- 
calion and Pyrrha, is represented as the father of the 
Hellenic nation. His three sons were JS'o-lus, Do'rus, 



76 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

and Xu'thus, from the two former of whom are repre- 
sented to have descended the iEo'lians and Do'rians; 
and from Achse'us and Fon, sons of Xuthus, the Achse'- 
ans and Io'nians. These four Hellenic or Grecian tribes 
were distinguished from one another by many peculiar- 
ities of language and institutions. Hellen is said to have 
left his kingdom to iEolus, his eldest son ; and the Mo- 
lian tribe spread the most widely, and long exerted the 
most influence in the affairs of the nation; but at a later 
period it was surpassed by the fame and the power of 
the Dorians and Ionians. 



III. THE HEROIC AGE. 

The period from the time of the first appearance of 
the Hellenes in Thessaly to the return of the Greeks 
from the expedition against Troy — a period of about two 
hundred years — is usually called the Heroic Age. It is 
a period abounding in splendid fictions of heroes and 
demi-gods, embracing, among others, the twelve wonder- 
ful labors of Hercules ; the exploits of the Athenian 
king The'sens, and of Mi'nos, King of Crete, the founder 
of Grecian law and civilization ; the events of the Argo- 
nautic expedition; the Theban and Argoric wars; the 
adventures of Beller'ophon, Per'seus, and many others; 
and concluding with the Trojan war and the supposed 
fall of Troy. These seem to have been the times which 
the archangel Michael foretold to Adam when he said, 

For in those days might only shall be admired, 
And valor and heroic virtue called : 
To overcome in battle, and subdue 
Nations, and bring home spoils with infinite 
Manslaughter, shall be held the highest pitch 
Of human glory ; and, for glory done, 
Of triumph to be styled great conquerors, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 77 

Patrons of mankind, gods, and sons of gods — 
Destroyers rightly called, and plagues of men. ' 

Paradise Lost, B. XL 

THE LABORS OF HERCULES. 

The twelve arduous labors of the celebrated hero 
Hercules, who was a son of Jupiter by the daughter of 
an early king of Mycenae, are said to have been imposed 
upon him by an enemy — Eurys'theus — to whose will Ju- 
piter, induced by a fraud of Juno and the fury-goddess 
A'te, and unwittingly bound by an oath, had made the 
hero subservient for twelve years. Jupiter grieved for 
his son, but, unable to recall the oath which he had 
sworn, he punished Ate by hurling her from Olympus 
down to the nether world. 

Grief seized the Thunderer, by his oath engaged ; 
Stung to the soul, he sorrowed and he raged. 
From his ambrosial head, where perched she sate, 
He snatched the fury-goddess of debate : 
The dread, the irrevocable oath he swore, 
The immortal seats should ne'er behold her more ; 
And whirled her headlong down, forever driven 
From bright Olympus and the starry heaven : 
Thence on the nether world the furv fell, 
Ordained with man's contentious race to dwell. 
Full oft the god his son's hard toils bemoaned, 
Cursed the dire fury, and in secret groaned. 

Homer's Iliad, B. XIX. Pope's Trans. 

The following, in brief, are the twelve labors attrib- 
uted to Hercules : 1. He strangled the Ne'mean lion, and 
ever after wore his skin. 2. He destroyed the Lernge'an 
hydra, which had nine heads, eight of them mortal and 
one immortal. 3. He brought into the presence of Eu- 
rystheus a stag famous for its incredible swiftness and 
golden horns. 4. He brought to Mycenae the wild boar 



78 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY". 

of Eryman'thus, and slew two of the Centaurs, monsters 
who were half men and half horses. 5. He cleansed the 
Auge'an stables in one day by changing the courses of 
the rivers Alphe'us and Pene'us. 6. He destroyed the 
carnivorous birds of the lake Stympha'lus, in Arcadia. 
7. He brought into Peloponnesus the prodigious wild 
bull which ravaged Crete. 8. He brought from Thrace 
the mares of Diome'de, which fed on human flesh. 9. He 
obtained the famous girdle of Hippol'y-te, queen of the 
Amazons. 10. He slew the monster Ge'ry-on, who had 
the bodies of three men united. 11. He brought from 
the garden of the Hesper'i-des the golden apples, and 
slew the dragon which guarded them. 12. He went 
' down to the lower regions and brought upon earth the 
three-headed dog Cer'berus. 

The favor of the gods had completely armed Hercules 
for his undertakings, and his great strength enabled him 
to perform them. This entire fable of Hercules is gen- 
erally believed to be merely a fanciful representation of 
the sun in its passage through the twelve signs of the 
zodiac, in accordance with Phoenician mythology, from 
which the legend is supposed to be derived. Thus Her- 
cules is the sun-god. In the first month of the year the 
sun passes through the constellation Leo, the lion ; and 
in his first labor the hero slays the Nemean lion. In 
the second month, when the sun enters the sign Virgo, 
the long-extended constellation of the Hydra sets— the 
stars of which, like so many heads, rise one after another; 
and, therefore, in his second labor, Hercules destroys the 
Lerngean hydra with its nine heads. In like manner the 
legend is explained throughout. Besides these twelve 
labors, however, Hercules is said to have achieved others 
on his own account ; and one of these is told in the fable 
of Hercules and Antae'us, in which the powers of art and 
nature are supposed to be personified. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 79 

FABLE OF HERCULES AND ANTJBUS. 

Antae'us — a son of Neptune and Terra, who reigned 
over Libya, or Africa, and dwelt in a forest cave — was so 
famed for his Titanic strength and skill in wrestling that 
he was emboldened to leave his woodland retreat and 
engage in a contest with the renowned hero Hercules. 
So long as Antaeus stood upon the ground he could not 
be overcome, whereupon Hercules lifted him up in the 
air, and, having apparently squeezed him to death in his 
arms, threw him down ; but when Antaeus touched his 
mother Earth and lay at rest upon her bosom, renewed 
life and fresh power were given him. 

In this fable Antaeus, who personifies the woodland 
solitude and the desert African waste, is easily overcome 
by his adversary, who represents the river Nile, which, 
divided into a thousand arms, or irrigating canals, pre- 
vents the arid sand from being borne away and then 
back again by the winds to desolate the fertile valley. 
Thus the legend is nothing more than the triumph of 
art and labor, and their reclaiming power over the 
woodland solitudes and the encroaching sands of the 
desert. An English poet has very happily versified the 
spirit of the legend, to which he has appended a fitting 
moral, doubtless suggested by the warning of his own 
approaching sad fate. 1 

Deep were the meanings of that fable. Men 

Looked upon earth with clearer eyesight then, 

Beheld in solitude the immortal Powers, 

And marked the traces of the swift-winged Hours. 

Because it never varies, all can bear 

The burden of the circumambient air ; 



_» This gifted poet, Mortimer Collins, died in 1876, at the age of forty- 
nine, a victim to excessive literary labor and anxiety. 



80 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Because it never ceases, none can hear 
The music of the ever- rolling sphere — 
None, save the poet, who, in moor and wood, 
Holds converse with the spirit of Solitude. 

And I remember how Antaeus heard, 

Deep in great oak-woods, the mysterious word 

Which said, " Go forth across the unshaven leas 

To meet unconquerable Hercules." 

Leaving his cavern by the cedar-glen, 

This Titan of the primal race of men, 

Whom the swart lions feared, and who could tear 

Huo*e oaks asunder, to the combat bare 

Courage undaunted. Full of giant grace, 

Built up, as 'twere, from earth's own granite base, 

Colossal, iron-sinewed, firm he trod 

The lawns. How vain against a demi-god ! 

Oh, sorrow of defeat ! He plunges far 

Into his forests, where deep shadows are, 

And the wind's murmur comes not, and the gloom 

Of pine and cedar seems to make a tomb 

For fallen ambition. Prone the mortal lies 

Who dared mad warfare with the unpitying skies, 

But lo ! as buried in the waving ferns, 

The baffled giant for oblivion yearns, 

Cursing his human feebleness, he feels 

A sudden impulse of new strength, which heals 

His angry wounds ; his vigor he regains — 

His blood is dancing gayly through his veins. 

Fresh power, fresh life is his who lay at rest 

On bounteous Hertha's a kind creative breast. 

Even so, O poet, by the world subdued, 
Regain thy health 'mid perfect solitude. 



» Hcrtha, a goddess of the ancient Germans, the same as Terra, or the 
Earth. Her favorite retreat was a sacred grove in an island of the ocean. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 81 

In noisy cities, far from hills and trees, 
The brawling demi-god, harsh Hercules, 
Has power to hurt thy placid spirit — power 
To crush thy joyous instincts every hour, 
To weary thee with woes for mortals stored, 
Red gold (coined hatred) and the tyrant's sword. 

Then — then, O sad Antaeus, wilt thou yearn 

For dense green woodlands and the fragrant fern : 

Then stretch thy form upon the sward, and rest 

From worldly toil on Hertha's gracious breast ; 

Plunge in the foaming river, or divide 

With happy arms gray ocean's murmuring tide, 

And drinking thence each solitary hour 

Immortal beauty and immortal power, 

Thou may'st the buffets of the world efface 

And live a Titan of earth's earliest race. 

Mortimer Collins. 

THE ARGONAUTIC EXPEDITION. 

From what was probably a maritime adventure that 
plundered some wealthy country at a period when navi- 
gation was in its infancy among the Greeks, we get the 
fable of the Argonautic Expedition. The generally ac- 
cepted story of this expedition is as follows : Pe'lias, a 
descendant of JS'o-lus, the mystic progenitor of the great 
MoYiq race, had deprived his half-brother iE'son of the 
kingdom of Iol'cns in Thessaly. When Jason, son of 
^Eson, had attained to manhood, he appeared before his 
uncle and demanded the throne. Pelias consented only 
on condition that Jason should first capture and bring to 
him the golden fleece of the ram which had carried 
Phrix'us and HelTe when they fled from their step- 
mother Fno. Helle dropped into the sea between Si- 
gae'um and the Cher'sonese, which was named from her 
Hellespon'tns ; but Phrixus succeeded in reaching CoF- 

4* 



82 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

chis, a country at the eastern extremity of the Euxine, or 
Black Sea. Here he sacrificed the ram, and nailed the 
fleece to an oak in the grove of Mars, where it was 
guarded by a sleepless dragon. 

Joined by the principal heroes of Greece, Hercules 
among the number, Jason set sail from Iolcus in the 
ship Argo, after first invoking the favor of Jupiter, the 
winds, and the waves, for the success of the expedition. 
The ceremony on this occasion, as described by the poets, 
reads like an account of the "christening of the ship" 
in modern times, but w T e seem to have lost the full sig- 
nificance of the act. 

Arid soon as by the vessel's bow 

The anchor was hung up, 

Then took the leader on the prow 

In hands a golden cup, 

And on great father Jove did call ; 

And on the winds and waters all 

Swept by the hurrying blast, 

And on the nights, and ocean ways, 

And on the fair auspicious days, 

And sweet return at last. 

From out the clouds, in answer kind, 

A voice of thunder came, 

And, shook in glistening beams around, 

Burst out the lightning flame. 

The chiefs breathed free, and, at the sign, 

Trusted in the power divine. 

Hinting sweet hopes, the seer cried 

Forthwith their oars to ply, 

And swift went backward from rough hands 

The rowing ceaselessly. 

Pindar. Trans, by Rev. H. F. Gary. 

After many adventures Jason reached Col'chis, where, 
by the aid of magic and supernatural arts, and through 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. ' 83 

the favor of Me-de'a, daughter of the King of Colchis, 
he succeeded in capturing the fleece. After four months 
of continued danger and innumerable hardships, Jason 
returned to Iolcus with the prize, accompanied by Me- 
dea, whom he afterward deserted, and whose subsequent 
history is told by the poet Euripides in his celebrated 
tragedy entitled Medea. 

Growing out of the Argonautic legend is one concern- 
ing the youth Hy'las, a member of the expedition, and a 
son of the King of Mys'ia, a country of Asia Minor. 
Hylas was greatly beloved by Hercules. On the coast 
of Mysia the Argonauts stopped to obtain a supply of 
water, and Hylas, having gone from the vessel. alone 
with an urn for the same purpose, takes the opportunity 
to bathe in the river Scaman'der, under the shadows of 
Mount Ida. He throws his purple chlamys, or cloak, 
over the urn, and passes down into the water, where he 
is seized by the nymphs of the stream, and, in spite of 
his struggles and entreaties, he is borne by them "down 
from the noonday brightness to their dark caves in the 
depths below." Hercules went in search of Hylas, and 
the ship sailed from its anchorage without him. We 
have a faithful and beautiful reproduction of this Greek 
legend, both in theme and spirit, in a poem by Bayard 
Taylor, from which the following extracts are taken : 

Hylas. 

Storm-wearied Argo slept upon the water. 
No cloud was seen : on blue and craggy Ida 
The hot noon lay, and on the plains enamel ; 
Cool in his bed, alone, the swift Scamander. 
' Why should I haste ?" said young and rosy Hylas ; 
The seas are rough, and long the way from Colchis. 
Beneath the snow-white awning slumbers Jason, 
Pillowed upon his tame Thessalian panther ; 



84 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The shields are piled, the listless oars suspended 
On the black thwarts, and all the hairy bondsmen 
Doze on the benches. They may wait for water 
Till I have bathed in mountain-born Scamander." 

He saw his glorious limbs reversely mirrored 

In the still wave, and stretched his foot to press it 

On the smooth sole that answered at the surface : 

Alas ! the shape dissolved in glittering fragments. 

Then, timidly at first, he dipped, and catching 

Quick breath, with tingling shudder, as the waters 

Swirled round his limbs, and deeper, slowly deeper, 

Till on his breast the river's cheek was pillowed ; 

And deeper still, till every shoreward ripple 

Talked in his ear, and like a cygnet's bosom 

His white, round shoulder shed the dripping crystal. 

There, as he floated with a rapturous motion, 

The lucid coolness folding close around him, 

The lily-cradling ripples murmured, " Hylas !" 

He shook from off his ears the hyacinthinp 

Curls that had lain unwet upon the water, 

And still the ripples murmured, " Hylas ! Hylas !" 

He thought — " The voices are but ear-born music. 

Pan dwells not here, and Echo still is calling 

From some high cliff that tops a Thracian valley ; 

So long mine ears, on tumbling Hellespontus, 

Have heard the sea-waves hammer Argo's forehead, 

That I misdeem the fluting of this current 

For some lost nymph"— Again the murmur, " Hylas !" 

The sound that seemed to come from the lilies was 
the voice of the sea-nymphs, calling to him to go with 
them where they wander — 

" Down beneath the green translucent ceiling— 
Where, on the sandy bed of old Scamander, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 85 

With cool white buds we braid our purple tresses, 
Lulled by the bubbling waves around us stealing." 

To all their entreaties Hylas exclaims : 

" Leave me, naiads ! 
Leave me !" he cried. " The day to me is dearer 
Than all your caves deep-spread in ocean's quiet. 
I would not change this flexile, warm existence, 
Though swept by storms, and shocked by Jove's dread thunder, 
To be a king beneath the dark-green waters. 
Let me return ! the wind comes down from Ida, 
And soon the galley, stirring from her slumber, 
Will fret to ride where Pelion's twilight shadow 
Falls o'er the towers of Jason's sea-girt city. 
I am not yours— I cannot braid the lilies 
In your wet hair, nor on your argent bosoms 
Close my drowsed eyes to hear your rippling voices. 
Hateful to me your sweet, cold, crystal being — 
Your world of watery quiet. Help, Apollo !" 

But the remonstrances and struggles of Hylas are 
unavailing' : 



The boy's blue eyes, upturned, looked through the water 

Pleading for help ; but heaven's immortal archer 

Was swathed in cloud. The ripples hid his forehead; 

And last, the thick, bright curls a moment floated, 

So warm and silky that the stream upbore thern, 

Closing reluctant as he sank forever. 

The sunset died behind the crags of Imbros. 

Argo was tugging at her chain ; for freshly 

Blew the swift breeze, and leaped the restless billows. 

The voice of Jason roused the dozing sailors, 

And up the mast was heaved the snowy canvas. 

But mighty Hercules, the Jove-begotten, 

Unmindful stood beside the cool Scamander, 



86 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Leaning upon his club. A purple chlamys 
Tossed o'er an urn was all that lay before him ; 
And when he called, expectant, "Hylas! Hylas!" 
The empty echoes made him answer — " Hylas !" 

THE TROJAN WAR. 

Of all the events of the Heroic period, however, the 
Trojan war has been rendered the most celebrated, 
through the genius of Homer. The alleged causes of 
the war, briefly stated, are these : Helen, the most beau- 
tiful woman of the age, and the daughter of Tyn'darus, 
King of Sparta, was sought in marriage by all the princes 
of Greece. Tyndarus, perplexed with the difficulty, of 
choosing one of the suitors without displeasing all the 
rest, being advised by the sage Ulysses, bound all of 
them by an oath that they would approve of the unin- 
fluenced choice of Helen, and would unite to restore 
her to her husband, and to avenge the outrage, if ever 
she was carried off. Menela'us became the choice of 
Helen, and soon after, on the death of Tyndarus, suc- 
ceeded to the vacant throne of Sparta. 

Three years subsequently, Paris, son of Priam, King 
of Ilium, or Troy, visited the court of Menelaus, where 
he was hospitably received ; but during the temporary 
absence of the latter he corrupted the fidelity of Helen, 
and induced her to flee with him to Troy. When 
Menelaus returned he assembled the Grecian princes, 
and prepared to avenge the outrage. Combining their 
forces under the command of Agamem'non, King of 
Myce'nse, a brother of Menelaus, they sailed wrli a great 
army for Troy. The imagination of the poet Eukipides 
describes this armament as follows : 

With eager haste 
The sea-girt Aulis strand I paced, 
Till to my view appeared the embattled train 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 87 

Of Hellas, armed for mighty enterprise, 

And galleys of majestic size, 

To bear the heroes o'er the main ; 

A thousand ships for Ilion steer, 
And round the two Atridae's spear 

The warriors swear fair Helen to regain. 

After a siege of ten years Troy was taken by strata- 
gem, and the fair Helen was recovered. On the fanci- 
fnl etymology of the word Helen, from a Greek verb 
signifying to take or seize, the poet ^Eschyixs indulges 
in the following reflections descriptive of the character 
and the history of this " spear- wooed maid of Greece :" 

Who gave her a name 
So true to her fame ? 
Does a Providence rule in the fate of a word ? 
Sways there in heaven a viewless power 
O'er the chance of the tongue in the naming hour? 

Who gave her a name, 
This daughter of strife, this daughter of shame, 
The spear-wooed maid of Greece ! 
Helen the taker ! 'tis plain to see, 
A taker of ships, a taker of men, 
A taker of cities is she ! 
From the soft-curtained chamber of Hymen she fled, 

By the breath of giant Zephyr sped, 
And shield-bearing throngs in marshalled array 
Hounded her flight o'er the printless way, 
Where the swift-flashing oar 
The fair booty bore 
To swirling Sim'o-is' leafy shore, 
And stirred the crimson fray. Tram, by Blackie. 

According to Homer, the principal Greek heroes en- 
gaged in the siege of Troy, aside from Agamemnon, 
were Menelaus, Achilles, Ulysses, Ajax (the son of 
Tel'amon), Di'omed, Patro'clus, and Palame'des ; while 



88 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

among the bravest of the defenders of Troy were Hec- 
tor, Sarpe'don, and iEne'as. 

The poet's story opens, in the tenth year of the siege, 
with an account of a contentious scene between two of 
the Grecian chiefs—Achilles and Agamemnon— which 
resulted in the withdrawal of Achilles and his forces 
from the Grecian army. The aid of the gods was in- 
voked in behalf of Achilles, and Jupiter sent a deceitful 
vision to Agamemnon, seeking to persuade him to lead 
his forces to battle, in order that the Greeks might real- 
ize their need of Achilles. Agamemnon first desired to 
ascertain the feeling or disposition of the army regard- 
ing the expedition it had undertaken, and so proposed a 
return to Greece, which was unanimously and unexpect- 
edly agreed to, and an advance was made toward the 
ships. But through the efforts of the valiant and saga- 
cious Ulysses all discontent on the part of the troops 
was suppressed, and they returned to the plains of 

Troy. 

Among those in the Grecian camp who had com- 
plained of their leaders, and of the folly of the expedi- 
tion itself, was a brawling, turbulent, and tumultuous 
character named Thersi'tes, whose insolence Ulysses 
sternly and effectively rebuked. The following sketch 
of Thersites reads like a picture drawn from modern 
life; while the merited reproof administered by Ulysses 
is in the happiest vein of just and patriotic indignation i 

Ulysses and Thersites. 

Thersites only clamored in the throng, 
Loquacious, loud, and turbulent of tongue ; 
Awed by no sliame, by no respect controlled, 
In scandal busy, in reproaches bold ; 
With witty malice, studious to defame, 
Scorn all his joy, and censure all his aim ; 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 89 

But chief he gloried, with licentious style, 
To lash the great, and monarchs to revile. 

His figure such as might his soul proclaim : 
One eye was blinking, and one leg was lame ; 
His mountain shoulders half his breast o'erspread, 
Thin hairs bestrew'd his long misshapen head ; 
Spleen to mankind his envious heart possessed, 
A*nd much he hated all — but most, the best. 
Ulysses or Achilles still his theme ; 
But royal scandal his delight supreme. 
Long had he lived the scorn of every Greek, 
Vext when he spoke, yet still they heard him speak : 
Sharp was his voice ; which, in the shrillest tone, 
Thus with injurious taunts attacked the throne. 

Ulysses, in his tent, listens awhile to the complaints, 
and censures, and scandals against the chiefs, with which 
Thersites addresses the throng gathered around him, 
and at length — 

With indignation sparkling in his eyes, 

He views the wretch, and sternly thus replies : 

' Peace, factious monster, born to vex the state 
With wrangling talents formed for foul debate, 
Curb that impetuous tongue, nor, rashly vain, 
And singly mad, asperse the sovereign reign. 

'Have we not known thee, slave ! of all our host 
The man who acts the least, upbraids the most? 
Think not the Greeks to shameful flight to bring, 
Nor let those lips profane the name of King. 
For our return we trust the heavenly powers ; 
Be that their care ; to fight like men be ours. 

1 But grant the host, with wealth our chieftain load ; 
Except detraction, what hast thou bestowed ? 



90 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Suppose some hero should his spoil resign, 

Art thou that hero ? Could those spoils be thine ? 

Gods ! let me perish on this hateful shore, 

And let these eyes behold my son no more, 

If on thy next offence this hand forbear 

To strip those arms thou ill deserv'st to wear, 

Expel the council where our princes meet, 

And send thee scourged and howling through the fleet." 

B. II. PoPE'ff Trans. 

COMBAT OF MENELAUS AND PARIS. 

The opposing armies being ready to engage, a single 
combat is agreed upon between Men elans, and Paris 
son of Priam, for the determination of the war. Paris 
is soon vanquished, but is rescued from death by Yenus ; 
and, according to the terms on which the combat took 
place, Agamemnon demands the restoration of Helen. 
But the gods declare that the war shall go on. So the 
conflict begins, and Diomed, assisted by the goddess 
Pallas (or Minerva), performs wonders in this day's bat- 
tle, wounding and putting to flight Pan'darus, ^Eneas, 
and the goddess Yenus, even wounding the war -god 
Mars, who had challenged him to combat, and sending 
him groaning back to heaven. 

Hector, the eldest son of Priam King of Troy, and 
the chief hero of the Trojans, leaves the field for a brief 
space, to request prayers to Mineiwa for assistance, and 
especially for the removal of Diomed from the fight. 
This done, he seeks a momentary interview with his 
wife, the fair and virtuous Androm'a-che, whose touch- 
ing appeal to him, and his reply, are both, perhaps, with- 
out a parallel in tender, natural solicitude. 

Parting of Hector and Andromache. 

" Too daring prince ! ah, whither dost thou run ? 
Ah, too forgetful of thy wife and son ! 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 91 

And think'st thou not how wretched we shall be, 
A widow I, a helpless orphan he? 
For sure such courage length of life denies, 
And thou must fall, thy virtue's sacrifice. 
Greece in her single heroes strove in vain ; 
Now hosts oppose thee, and thou must be slain ! 
Oh grant me, gods ! ere Hector meets his doom, 
All I can ask of heaven, an early tomb ! 
So shall my days in one sad tenor run, 
And end with sorrows as they first begun. 

" No parent now remains my griefs to share, 
No father's aid, no mother's tender care. 
The fierce Achilles wrapp'd our walls in fire, 
Laid The'be waste, and slew my warlike sire ! 
By the same arm my seven brave brothers fell ; 
In one sad day beheld the gates of hell. 
My mother lived to bear the victor's bands, 
The queen of Hippopla'cia's sylvan lands. 

" Yet, while my Hector still survives, I see 
My father, mother, brethren, all in thee : 
Alas ! my parents, brothers, kindred, all 
Once more will perish, if my Hector fall. 
Thy wife, thy infant, in thy danger share : 
Oh, prove a husband's and a father's care ! 
That quarter most the skilful Greeks annoy, 
Where yon wild fig-trees join the walls of Troy ; 
Thou from this tower defend the important post; 
There Agamemnon points his dreadful host, 
That pass Tydi'des, Ajax, strive to gain, 
And there the vengeful Spartan fires his train. 
Thrice our bold foes the fierce attack have given, 
Or led by hopes, or dictated from heaven. 
Let others in the field their arms employ, 
But stay my Hector here, and guard his Troy." 



92 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The chief replied: "That post shall be my care, 
Nor that alone, but all the works of war. 
How would the sons of Troy, in arms renown'd, 
And Troy's proud dames, whose garments sweep the ground, 
Attaint the lustre of my former name, 
Should Hector basely quit the field of fame ! 
My early youth was bred to martial pains, 
My soul impels me to the embattled plains : 
Let me be foremost to defend the throne, 
And guard my father's glories and my own. 

" Yet come it will, the day decreed by fates ; 
(How my heart trembles while my tongue relates !) 
The day when thou, imperial Troy ! must bend, 
Must see thy warriors fall, thy glories end. 
And yet no dire presage so wounds my mind, 
My mother's death, the ruin of my kind, 
Not Priam's hoary hairs defiled with gore, 
Not all my brothers gasping on the shore, 
As thine, Andromache ! thy griefs I dread. 

" I see thee trembling, weeping, captive led ! 
In Argive looms our battles to design, 
And woes, of which so large a part was thine ! 
To bear the victor's hard commands, or bring 
The weight of waters from Hype'ria's spring. 
There, while you groan beneath the load of life, 
They cry : ' Behold the mighty Hector's wife !' 
Some hauo-htv Greek, who lives thy tears to see, 
Embitters all thy woes by naming me. 
The thoughts of glory past, and present shame, 
A thousand griefs shall waken at the name ! 
May I lie cold before that dreadful day, 
Pressed with a load of monumental clay ! 
Thy Hector, wrapt in everlasting sleep, 
Shall neither hear thee sigh, nor see thee weep." 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 93 

Thus having spoke, the illustrious chief of Troy- 
Stretched his fond arms to clasp the lovely boy. 
The babe clung crying to his nurse's breast, 
Scared at the dazzling helm and nodding crest. 
With secret pleasure each fond parent smiled, 
And Hector hasted to relieve his child ; 
The glittering terrors from his brows unbound, 
And placed the beaming helmet on the ground. 
Then kissed the child, and, lifting high in air, 
Thus to the gods preferred a father's prayer : 

" O thou ! whose glory fills the ethereal throne, 
And all ye deathless powers ! protect my son ! 
Grant him, like me, to purchase just renown, 
To guard the Trojans, to defend the crown, 
Against his country's foes the war to wage, 
And rise the Hector of the future age ! 
So when triumphant from successful toils, 
Of heroes slain he bears the reeking spoils, 
Whole hosts may hail him with deserved acclaim, 
And say, ' This chief transcends his father's fame ;' 
While pleased, amidst the general shouts of Troy, 
His mother's conscious heart o'erflows with joy." 

He spoke, and fondly gazing on her charms, 
Restored the pleasing burden to her arms ; 
Soft on her fragrant breast the babe he laid, 
Hush'd to repose, and with a smile survey'd. 
The troubled pleasure soon chastised by fear, 
She mingled with the smile a tender tear. 
The soften'd chief with kind compassion view'd, 
And dried the falling drops, and thus pursued : 

" Andromache, my soul's far better part, 
Why with untimely sorrows heaves thy heart ? 
No hostile hand can antedate my doom, 
Till fate condemns me to the silent tomb. 



94 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Fix'd is the term to all the race of earth ; 
And such the hard condition of our birth, 
No force can then resist, no flight can save — 
All sink alike, the fearful and the brave. 
No more — but hasten to thy tasks at home, 
There guide the spindle and direct the loom : 
Me, glory summons to the martial scene — 
The field of combat is the sphere of men ; 
Where heroes war, the foremost place I claim, 
The first in danger, as the first in fame." 

Thus having said, the glorious chief resumes 
His towery helmet black with shading plumes. 
His princess parts with a prophetic sigh, 
Unwilling parts, and oft reverts her eye, 
That stream'd at every look; then, moving slow, 
Sought her own palace and indulged her woe. 
There, while her tears deplored the godlike man, 
Through all her train the soft infection ran : 
The pious maids their mingled sorrows shed, 
And. mourn the living Hector as the dead. 

B. VI. Pope's Trans. 

HECTOR'S EXPLOITS, AND DEATH OF PATRO'CLUS. 

Hector hastened to the field, and there his exploits 
aroused the enthusiasm and courage of his countrymen, 
who drove back the Grecian hosts. Disheartened, the 
Greeks sent Ulysses and Ajax to Achilles to plead with 
that warrior for his return with his forces to the Gre- 
cian camp. But Achilles obstinately refused to take 
part in the conflict, which was continued with varying 
success, until the Trojans succeeded in breaking through 
the Grecian wall, and attempted to fire the Greek ships, 
which were saved by the valor of Ajax. In compliance 
with the request of the aged Nestor, however, of whom 
the poet Young tells us that — 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 95 

When Nestor spoke, none asked if he prevailed ; 
That god of sweet persuasion never failed — 

Achilles now placed his own armor on Patroclus, and, 
giving him also his shield, sent him to the aid of the 
Greeks. The Trojans, supposing Patroclus to be the 
famous Achilles, became panic-stricken, and were pur- 
sued with great slaughter to the walls of Troy. 

Apollo now goes to the aid of the Trojans, smites 
Patroclus, whose armor is strewn on the plain, and then 
the hero is killed by Hector, who proudly places the 
plume of Achilles on his own helmet. 

His spear in shivers falls ; his ample shield 
Drops from his arm ; his baldric strews the field ; 
The corslet his astonished breast forsakes ; 
Loose is each joint ; each nerve with horror shakes ; 
Stupid he stares, and all assistless stands : 
Such is the force of more than mortal hands. 

Achilles' plume is stained with dust and gore : 
That plume which never stooped to earth before, 
Long used, untouched, in fighting fields to shine, 
And shade the temples of the mad divine. 
Jove dooms it now on Hector's helm to nod ; 
Not long — for fate pursues him, and the god. b. XVI. 

Then ensued a most terrific conflict for the body of 
the slain warrior, in which Ajax, Glaucus, Hector, ^Ene- 
as, and Menelaus participated, the latter finally succeed- 
ing in bearing it off to the ships. The grief of Achilles 
over the body of his friend, and at the loss of his won- 
derful armor, is represented as being intense ; and so 
great a blow to the Greeks was the loss of the armor 
considered, that Vulcan formed for Achilles a new one, 
and also a new shield. Homer's description of the lat- 
ter piece of marvellous workmanship — which is often 



96 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

referred to as a truthful picture of the times, and espec- 
ially of the advanced condition of some of the arts and 
sciences in the Heroic, or post-Heroic, age— is too long 
for insertion here entire ; but we proceed to give suffi- 
cient extracts from it to show at least the magnificent 
conception of the poet. 

How Vulcan Formed the Shield of Achilles. 

He first a vast and massive buckler made ; 
There all the wonders of his work displayed, 
With silver belt adorned, and triply wound, 
Orb within orb, the border beaming round. 
Five plates composed the shield ; these Vulcan's art 
Charged with his skilful mind each varied part. 

There earth, there heaven appeared; there ocean flowed; 
There the orbed moon and sun unwearied glowed; 
There every star that gems the brow of night — 
Ple'iads and Hy'ads, and O-ri'on's might ; 
The Bear, that, watchful in his ceaseless roll 
Around the star whose light illumes the pole, 
Still eyes Orion, nor e'er stoops to lave 
His beams unconscious of the ocean wave. 

There, by the god's creative power revealed, 
Two stately cities filled with life the shield. 
Here nuptials— solemn rites— and throngs of gay 
Assembled guests, forth issuing filled the way. 
Bright blazed the torches as they swept along 
Through streets that rung with hymeneal song ; 
And while gay youths, swift circling round and round, 
Danced to the pipe and harp's harmonious sound, 
The women thronged, and wondering as they viewed, 
Stood in each portal and the pomp pursued. 

Next on the shield a forum met the view ; 
Two men, contending, there a concourse drew : 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 97 

A citizen was slain ; keen rose the strife — 
'Tvvas compensation claim'd for loss of life. 
This swore, the mulct for blood was strictly paid : 
This, that the fine long- due was yet delayed. 
Both claim'd th' award and bade the laws decide ; 
And partial numbers, ranged on either side, 
With eager clamors for decision call, 
Till the feared heralds seat and silence all. 
There the hoar elders, in their sacred place, 
On seats of polished stone the circle grace ; 
Rise with a herald's sceptre, weigh the cause, 
And speak in turn the sentence of the laws ; 
While, in the midst, for him to bear away 
Who rightliest spoke, two golden talents lay. 

The other city on the shield displayed 
Two hosts that girt it, in bright mail arrayed; 
Diverse their counsel : these to burn decide, 
And those to seize, and all its wealth divide. 
The town their summons scorned, resistance dared, 
And secretly for ambush arms prepared. 
AVife, grandsire, child, one soul alike in all, 
Stand on the battlements and guard the wall. 
Mars, Pallas, led their host : gold either god, 
A golden radiance from their armor flowed. 

Next, described as displayed on the shield, is a picture 
of spies at a distance, an ambuscade, and a battle ; the 
scene then changes to ploughing and sowing, and the 
incidents connected with the gathering of a bountiful 
harvest; then are introduced a vineyard, the gathering 
of the grapes, and a merrymaking by the youths at the 
close of the day ; then we have a wild outlying scene 
of herdsmen with their cattle, the latter attacked by two 
famished lions, and the tumult that followed. The de- 
scription closes as follows : 

5 



98 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Now the god's changeful artifice displayed 
Fair flocks at pasture in a lovely glade ; 
And folds and sheltering stalls peeped up between, 
And shepherd-huts diversified the scene. 

Now on the shield a choir appear'd to move, 
Whose flying feet the tuneful labyrinth wove; 
Youths and fair girls there, hand in hand, advanced, 
Timed to the song their steps, and gayly danced. 
Bound every maid light robes of linen flowed ; 
Round every youth a glossy tunic glowed ; 
Those wreathed with flowers, while from their partners hung 
Swords that, all gold, from belts of silver swung. 

Train'd by nice art each flexile limb to wind, 
Their twinkling feet the measured maze entwined, 
Fleet as the wheel whose use the potter tries, 
When, twirl'd beneath his hand, its axle flies. 
Now all at once their graceful ranks combine, 
Each rang'd against the other, line with line. 

The crowd flock'd round, and, wondering as they view'd, 
Thro' every change the varying dance pursued ; 
The while two tumblers, as they led the song, 
Turned in the midst and rolled themselves along. 
Then, last, the god the force of Ocean bound, 
And poured its waves the buckler's orb around. 

B. XVIII. Sotheby's Trans. 

Achilles Engages in the Fight. 

Desire to avenge the death of Patroclns proves more 
powerful in the breast of Achilles than anger against 
Agamemnon, and, clad in his new armor, lie is with 
difficulty restrained from rushing alone into the fight 
while his comrades are resting. Turning and addressing 
his horses, he reproaches them with the deatli of Patro- 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 99 

clus. One of them is represented as being miraculously 
endowed with voice, and, replying to Achilles, prophe- 
sies his death in the near future; but, with unabated 
rage, the intrepid chief replies : 

"So let it be I 

Portents and prodigies are lost on me. t 

I know my fate : to die, to see'no more 
My much-loved parents and my native shore. 
Enough— when Heaven ordains I sink in night. 
Now perish Troy !" he said, and rushed to nVht. 

Jupiter now assembles the gods in council, and permits 
them to assist either party. The poet vividly describes 
the terrors of the combat and the tumult that arose when 
"the powers descending swelled the fight." Achilles 
first encounters ^Ene'as, who is preserved bv Neptune; 
he then meets Hector, whom he is on the point of kill- 
ing, when Apollo rescues him and carries him away in 
a cloud. The Trojans, defeated with terrible slaughter, 
are driven into the river Scaraander, where Achilles re- 
ceives the aid of Neptune and Pallas. 

The Death of Hector. 
Vulcan having dried up the Scamander in aid of the 
Trojans, all those who survive, save Hector, seek refuge 
in Troy. This hero alone remains without the walls 
to oppose Achilles. At the latter's advance, however, 
Hector's resolution and courage fail him, and he flees^ 
pursued by Achilles three times around the city. At 
length he turns upon his pursuer, determined to meet 
his fate; and the account of the meeting and contest 
with Achilles, as translated by Bryant, is as follows : 

He spake, and drew the keen-edged sword that hung, 
Massive and finely tempered, at his side, 



100 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

And sprang — as when an eagle high in heaven 

Through the thick cloud darts downward to the plain, 

To clutch some tender lamb or timid hare. 

So Hector, brandishing that keen-edged sword, 

Sprang forward, while Achilles opposite 

Leaped toward him, all on fire with savage hate, 

And holding his bright buckler,* nobly wrought, 

Before him. As in the still hours of night 

Hesper goes forth among the host of stars, 

The fairest light of heaven, so brightly shone, 

Brandished in the right hand of Pe'leus' son, 

The spear's keen blade, as, confident to slay 

The noble Hector, o'er his glorious form 

His quick eye ran, exploring where to plant 

The surest wound. The glittering mail of brass 

Won from the slain Patroclus guarded well 

Each part, save only where the collar-bones 

Divide the shoulder from the neck, and there 

Appeared the throat, the spot where life is most 

In peril. Through that part the noble son 

Of Peleus drave his spear ; it went quite through 

The tender neck, and yet the brazen blade 

Cleft net the windpipe, and the power to speak 

Remained. * * * 

And then the crested Hector faintly said : 
" I pray thee, by thy life, and by thy knees, 
And by thy parents, suffer not the dogs 
To tear me at the galleys of the Greeks. 
Accept abundant store of brass and gold, 
Which gladly will my father and the queen, 
My mother, give in ransom. Send to them 
My body, that the warriors and the dames 
Of Troy may light for me the funeral pile." 

The swift Achilles answered, with a frown : 
" Nay, by my knees entreat me not, thou cur, 
Nor by my parents. I could even wish 
My fury prompted me to cut thy flesh 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 101 

In fragments and devour it, such the wrong 

That I have had from thee. There will be none 

To drive away the dogs about thy head, 

Not though thy Trojan friends should bring to me 

Tenfold and twenty fold the offered gifts, 

And promise others— not though Priam, sprung 

From Dar'danus, should send thy weight in gold. 

Thy mother shall not lay thee on thy bier, 

To sorrow over thee whom she brought forth ; 

But dogs arid birds of prey shall mangle thee." 

And then the crested Hector, dying, said : 
" I know thee, and too clearly I foresaw 
I should not move thee, for thou hast a heart 
Of iron. Yet reflect that for my sake 
The anger of the gods may fall on thee 
When Paris and Apollo strike thee down, 
Strong as thou art, before the Scae'an gates." 

Thus Hector spake, and straightway o'er him closed 
The light of death ; the soul forsook his limbs, 
And flew to Hades, grieving for its fate, 
So soon divorced from youth and youthful might. 

The great achievement of Achilles was followed by 
funeral games in honor of Patroclus, and by the institu- 
tion of various other festivities. At their close Jupiter 
sends The'tis to Achilles to influence him to restore the 
dead body of Hector to his family, and sends Iris to 
Priam to encourage him to go in person to treat for it. 
Priam thereupon sets out upon his journey, and, having 
arrived at the camp of Achilles, thus appeals to his 
compassion : 

Priam Begging for the Body of Hector. 

1 Think, O Achilles, semblance of the gods, 
On thine own father, full of days like me, 
And trembling on the gloomy verge of life. 



102 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Some neighbor chief, it may be, even now 
Oppresses him, and there is none at hand, 
No friend, to succor him in his distress. 
Yet, doubtless, hearing that Achilles lives, 
He still rejoices, hoping day by day 
That one day he shall see the face again 
Of his own son, from distant Troy returned. 
But me no comfort cheers, whose bravest sons, 
So late the flowers of Ilium, are all slain. 

" When Greece came hither I had fiftv sons: 
But fiery Mars hath thinned them. One I had — 
One, more than all my sons, the strength of Troy, 
Whom, standing for his country, thou hast slain — 
Hector. His body to redeem I come 
Into Achaia's fleet, bringing, myself, 
Ransom inestimable to thy tent. 
Rev'rence the gods, Achilles ! recollect 
Thy father ; for his sake compassion show 
To me, more pitiable still, who draw 
Home to my lips (humiliation yet 
Unseen on earth) his hand who slew my son !" 

Cowper's Trans. 

Achilles, moved with compassion, granted the request 
of the grief-stricken father, and sent him home with the 
body of his son. First to the corse the weeping An- 
dromache flew, and thus spoke : 

Lamentation of Andromache. 

" And oh, my Hector ! Oh, my lord ! (she cries) 
Snatched in thy bloom from these desiring eyes ! 
Thou to the dismal realms forever gone ! 
And I abandoned, desolate, alone ! 
An only son, once comfort of our pains, 
Sad product now of hapless love, remains! 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 103 

Never to manly age that son shall rise, 
Or with increasing graces glad my eyes; 
For Uion now (her great defender slain) 
Shall sink a smoking ruin on the plain. 

" Who now protects her wives with guardian care ? 
Who saves her infants from the rage of war? 
Now hostile fleets must w r aft those infants o'er 
(Those wives must wait them) to a foreign shore : 
Thou too, my son, to barbarous climes shalt go, 
The sad companion of thy mother's woe ; 
Or else some Greek whose father pressed the plain, 
Or son, or brother, by great Hector slain, 
In Hector's blood his vengeance shall enjoy, 
And hurl thee headlong from the towers of Troy." ' 

The death of Hector was also lamented by Helen, and 
her lamentation is thus spoken of by Coleridge: "I 
have always thought the following speech, in which 
Helen laments Hector, and hints at her own invidious 
and unprotected situation in Troy, as almost the sweet- 
est passage in the poem. It is another striking instance 
of that refinement of feeling and softness of tone which 
so generally distinguish the last book of the Iliad from 
the rest." 

Helen's Lamentation. 

" Ah, dearest friend ! in whom the gods had joined 
The mildest manners with the bravest mind, 
Now twice ten years (unhappy years) are o'er 
Since Paris brought me to the Trojan shore ; 
(Oh, had I perished ere that form divine 
Seduced this soft, this easy heart of mine!) 



1 Such was the fate of Astj'anax, Hector's son, when Troy was taken : 

"Here, from the tower by stern Ulysses thrown, 
Andromache bewailed her infant son." 

Meueiok's Tryphiodo'rus. 



104 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Yet was it ne'er my fate from thee to find 

A deed ungentle, or a word unkind : 

When others cursed the authoress of their woe, 

Thy pity checked my sorrows in their flow : 

If some proud brother eyed me with disdain, 

Or scornful sister, with her sweeping train, 

Thy gentle accents softened all my pain. 

For thee I mourn ; and mourn myself in thee, 

The wretched source of all this misery. 

The fate I caused forever I bemoan ; 

Sad Helen has no friend, now thou art gone ! 

Through Troy's wide streets abandoned shall I roam ! 

In Troy deserted, as abhorred at home !" Pope's Trans. 

THE FATE OF TROY. 

Homer's Iliad ends with the burial of Hector, and 
gives no account of the result of the war and the fate 
of the chief actors in the conflict. But in Virgil's 
jEne'id) which gives an account of the escape of iEne'as 
from the flames of Troy, and of his wanderings until he 
reaches the shores of Italy, the way in which Troy is 
taken, soon after the death of Hector, is told by iEneas 
to Dido, the Queen of Carthage. By the advice of 
Ulysses a huge wooden horse was constructed in the 
Greek camp, in which he and other Grecian warriors 
concealed themselves, while the remainder burned their 
tents and sailed away to the island of Ten'edos, behind 
which they secreted their vessels. iEneas begins his 
account as follows : 

"By destiny compelled, and in despair, 
The Greeks grew weary of the tedious war, 
And bv Minerva's aid a fabric reared 
Which like a steed of monstrous height appeared. 
The sides were planked with pine : they feigned it made 
For their return, and this the vow they paid. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 105 

Thus they pretend, but in the hollow side 
Selected numbers of their soldiers hide ; 
With inward arras the dire machine they load, 
And iron bowels stuff the dark abode. 

" In sight of Troy lies Tenedos, an isle 
(While Fortune did on Priam's empire smile) 
Renowned for wealth ; but since, a faithless bay, 
Where ships exposed to wind and weather lay. 
There was their fleet concealed. We thought for Greece 
Their sails were hoisted, and onr fears release. 
The Trojans, cooped within their walls so long, 
Unbar their gates, and issue in a throng, 
Like swarming bees, and with delight survey 
The camp deserted where the Grecians lay. 
The quarters of the sev'ral chiefs they showed— 
Here Phoenix,, here Achilles, made abode ; 
Here joined the battles ; there the navy rode. 

'* Part on the pile their wond'ring eyes employ — 
The pile by Pallas raised to ruin Troy. 
Thymce'tes first ('tis doubtful whether hired, 
Or so the Trojan destiny required) 
Moved that the ramparts might be broken down 
To lodge the monster fabric in the town. 
But Ca'pys, and the rest of sounder mind, 
The fatal present to the flames designed, 
Or to the wat'ry deep ; at least to bore 
The hollow sides, and hidden frauds explore. 

" The giddy vulgar, as their fancies guide, 
With noise say nothing, and in parts divide. 
La-oc'o-on, followed by a num'rous crowd, 
Ran from the fort, and cried, from far, aloud : 
1 wretched countrymen ! what fury reigns ? 
What more than madness has possessed your brains? 

5* 



106 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Think you the Grecians from your coasts are gone ? 

And are Ulysses' arts no better known ? 

This hollow fabric either must enclose, 

Within its blind recess, our hidden foes ; 

Or 'tis an engine raised above the town 

T' o'erlook the walls, and then to batter down. 

Somewhat is sure designed by fraud or force — 

Trust not their presents, nor admit the horse.' 

" Thus having said, against the steed he threw 
His forceful spear, which, hissing as it flew, 
Pierced through the yielding planks of jointed wood, 
And trembling in the hollow belly stood. 
The sides, transpierced, return a rattling sound, 
And groans of Greeks enclosed came issuing through the wound ; 
And, had not Heaven the fall of Troy designed, 
Or had not men been fated to be blind, 
Enough was said and done t' inspire a better mind. 
Then had our lances pierced the treacherous wood, 
And Ilion's towers and Priam's empire stood." 

Deceived by the treachery of Sinon, a captive Greek, 
who represents that the wooden horse was built and 
dedicated to Minerva to secure the aid that the goddess 
had hitherto refused the Greeks, and that, if it were 
admitted within the walls of Troy, the Grecian hopes 
would be forever lost, the infatuated Trojans break 
down a portion of the city's wall, and, drawing in the 
horse, give themselves up to festivity and rejoicing. 
iEneas continues the story as follows : 

" With such deceits he gained their easy hearts, 

Too prone to credit his perfidious arts. 

What Di'omed, nor Thetis' greater son, 

A thousand ships, nor ten years' siege, had done — 

False tears and fawning words the city won. 
****** 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 107 

"A spacious breach is made ; the town lies bare ; 
Some hoisting levers, some the wheels prepare, 
And fasten to the horse's feet ; the rest 
With cables haul along th' unwieldy beast : 
Each on his fellow for assistance calls. 
At length the fatal fabric mounts the walls, 
Big with destruction. Boys with chaplets crowned, 
And choirs of virgins, sing and dance around. 
Thus raised aloft, and then descending down, 
It enters o'er our heads, and threats the town. 
O sacred city, built by hands divine ! 
O valiant heroes of the Trojan line ! 
Four times he struck ; as oft the clashing sound 
Of arms was heard, and inward groans rebound. 
Yet, mad with zeal, and blinded with our fate, 
We haul along the horse in solemn state, 
Then place the dire portent within the tower. 
Cassandra cried and cursed th' unhappy hour, 
Foretold our fate ; but, by the gods' decree, 
All heard, and none believed the prophecy. 
With branches we the fane adorn, and waste 
In jollity the day ordained to be the last." 

The jEntid. Book II.— Drtden. 

In the dead of night Sinon unlocked the horse, the 
Greeks rushed out, opened the gates of the city, and 
raised torches as a signal to those at Tenedos, who re- 
turned, and Troy was soon captured and given over to 
fire and the sword. Then followed the rejoicings of 
the victors, and the weeping and wailing of the Trojan 
women about to be carried away captive into distant 
lauds, according to the usages of war. 

The stately walls of Troy had sunken, 
Her towers and temples strewed the soil ; 

The sons of Hellas, victory-drunken, 
Richly laden with the spoil, 



108 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Are on their lofty barks reclined 

Along the Hellespontine strand ; 
A gleesome freight the favoring wind 
Shall bear to Greete's glorious land ; 
And gleesorne chant the choral strain, 
As toward the household altars now 
Each, bark inclines the painted prow — 
For Home shall smile again ! 

And there the Trojan women, weeping, 

Sit ranged in many a length'ning row ; 
Their heedless locks, dishevelled, sweeping 

Adown the wan cheeks worn with woe. 

No festive sounds that peal along, 
Their mournful dirge can overwhelm ; 

Through hymns of joy one sorrowing song, 
Commingled, wails the ruined realm. 

" Farewell, beloved shores !" it said ; 
" From home afar behold us torn, 
By foreign lords as captives borne — 

Ah, happy are the dead !" Schiller. 

For ten long years the Greeks at Argos had watched 
nightly for the beacon fires, lighted from point to point, 
that should announce the doom of Troy. When, in the 
Agamemnon of ^Eschyltjs, Clytemnes'tra declares that 
Troy has fallen, and the chorus, half incredulous, demands 
what messenger had brought the intelligence, she replies : 

" A gleam — a gleam — from Ida's height 

By the fire-god sent, it came ; 
From watch to watch it leaped, that light ; 
As a rider rode the flame ! 

It shot through the startled sky, 

And the torch of that blazing glory 
Old Lemnos caught on high 
On its holy promontory, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 109 

And sent it on, the jocund sio-n 
To Athos, mount of Jove divine. 
Wildly the while it rose from the isle, 
So that the might of the journeying light 
Skimmed over the back of the gleaming brine ! 

Farther and faster speeds it on, 
Till the watch that keep Macis'tus steep 
See it burst like a blazing sun ! 
Doth Macistus sleep 
On his tower-clad steep ? 
No ! rapid and red doth the wildfire sweep : 
It flashes afar on the wayward stream 
Of the wild Euri'pus, the rushing beam ! 
It rouses the light on Messa'pion's height, 
And they feed its breath with the withered heath. 
But it may not stay ! 
And away — away — 
It bounds in its fresh'ning might. 

"Silent and soon 
Like a broadened moon 
It passes in sheen Aso'pus green, 
And bursts in Cithae'ron gray. 
The warden wakes to the signal rays, 
And it swoops from the hills with a broader blaze : 
On — on the fiery glory rode — 
Thy lonely lake, Gorgo'pis, glo wed- 
To Meg'ara's mount it came ; 
They feed it again, 
And it streams amain — 
A giant beard of flame ! 
The headland cliffs that darkly down 
O'er the Saron'ic waters frown, 
Are passed with the swift one's lurid stride, 
And the huge rock glares on the glaring tide. 
With mightier march and fiercer power 
It gained Arach'ne's neighboring tower — 



110 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTOKY. 

Thence on our Ar'give roof its rest it won, 

Of Ida's fire the long-descended son ! 

Bright harbinger of glory and of joy ! 

So first and last with equal honor crowned, 

In solemn feasts the race-torch circles round. 

And these my heralds, this my sign of Peace ! 

Lo ! while we breathe, the victor lords of Greece 

Stalk, in stern tumult through the halls of Trov." 

Trans, by Bulwer. 

Such, in brief, is the commonly received account of 
the Trojan war, as we find it in Homer and other an- 
cient writers. Concerning it the historian Thirlwall 
remarks : " We consider it necessary to admit the real- 
ity of the Trojan war as a general fact, but beyond this 
we scarcely venture to proceed a single step. We find 
it impossible to adopt the poetical story of Helen, partly 
on account of its inherent improbability, and partly be- 
cause we are convinced that Helen is a merely mytho- 
logical person." Gkote says: 1 "In the eyes of modern 
inquiry the Trojan war is essentially a legend and noth- 
ing more. If we are asked if it be not a legend em- 
bodying portions of historical matter, and raised upon a 
basis of truth — whether there may not really have oc- 
curred at the foot of the hill of Ilium a war purely hu- 
man and political, without gods, without heroes, without 
Helen, without Amazons, without Ethiopians under the 
beautiful son of Eos, without the wooden horse, without 
the characteristic and expressive features of the old epic 
war — if we are asked if there was not really some such 
historical Trojan war as this, our answer must be, that 
as the possibility of it cannot be denied, so neither can 
the reality of it be affirmed." In this connection it is 
interesting to note that *the discoveries of the German 

1 "History of Greece," Chap. xv. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. Ill 

explorer, Schliemann, upon the site of ancient Troy, in- 
dicate that Homer " followed actual occurrences more 
closely than an over- sceptical historical criticism was 
once willing to allow." 

FATE OF THE CHIEF ACTORS W THE CONFLICT. 

Of the fate of some of the principal actors in the 
Trojan war it may be stated that, of the prominent 
Trojans, ^Eneas alone escaped. After many years of 
wanderings he landed in Italy with a small company 
of Trojans ; and the Eoman writers trace to him the 
origin of their nation. Priam was killed by Pyrrhus, 
the son of Achilles, during the burning of Troy ; while 
Achilles himself fell some time before, shot with an 
arrow in the heel by Paris, as Hector had prophesied 
would be the manner of his death. Ajax, after the 
death of Achilles, had a contest with Ulysses for the. 
armor of the dead hero, but was unsuccessful, and died 
by his own hand. The poet En'ottjb ascribes the fol- 
lowing declaration to Tel'amon, the father of Ajax 
when he heard of his son's death : ' 

I knew, when I begat him, he must die, 

And trained him to no other destiny 

Knew, when I sent him to the Trojan shore, 
'Twas not to halls of feast, but fields of gore. 

Trans, by Peters. 

Agamemnon, on his return to Greece, was barbar- 
ously murdered by his unfaithful queen, Clytemnestra. 
Diomed was driven from Greece, and barely escaped 
with his life. It is uncertain where or how he died. 
Ulysses, after almost innumerable troubles and hard- 
ships by sea and land, at last returned in safety to 
Ithaca. His wanderings are the subject of Homer's 
Odyssey. 

But it may be asked, what became of Helen, the pri- 



112 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

raary cause of the Trojan war, disastrous alike to victors 
and vanquished ? According to Virgil, 1 after the death 
of Paris she married the Trojan hero, De-iph'o-bus, and 
on the night after the city was taken betrayed him to 
Menela'us, to whom she became reconciled, and whom 
she accompanied, as Homer relates, 2 during the eight 
years of his wandering, on his return to Greece. Lan- 
dok, in one of his Hellen'ics, represents Menelaus, after 
the fall of Troy, as pursuing Helen up the steps of the 
palace, and threatening her with death. He thus ad- 
dresses her: 

" Stand, traitress, on that stair — 

Thou mountest not another, by the gods ! 

Now take the death thou meritest, the death, 

Zens, who presides over hospitality — 

And every other god whom thou has left, 

And every other who abandons thee 

In this accursed city — sends at last. 

Turn, vilest of vile slaves ! turn, paramour 

Of what all other women hate, of cowards ; 

Turn, lest this hand wrench back thy head, and toss 

It and its odors to the dust and flames." 

Helen penitently receives his reproaches, and wel- 
comes the threatened death; and when he speaks of 
their daughter, HermiVne, whom, an infant, she had so 
cruelly deserted, she exclaims : 

" O my child ! 
My only one ! thou livest : 'tis enough ; 
Hate me, abhor me, curse me — these are duties — 
Call me but mother in the shades of death ! 
She now is twelve years old, when the bud swells, 
And the first colors of uncertain life 
Begin to tinge it." 



^neid,B. VI. 2 Odyssey, B. IV. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 113 

Menelaus turns aside to say, 

" Can she think of home ? 
Hers once, mine yet, and sweet Hermione's ! 
Is there one spark that cheered ray hearth, one left 
For thee, my last of love ?" 

When she beseeches him to delay not her merited fate 
her words greatly move him, and he exclaims (aside), ' 

" Her voice is musical 
As the young maids who sing to Artemis: 
How glossy is that yellow braid my grasp 
Seized and let loose ! Ah, can ten years have passed 
Since— but the children of the gods, like them, 
Suffer not age. 1 

(Then turning to Helen.) Helen ! speak honestly, 
And thus escape my vengeance — was it force 
That bore thee off ?" 

Her words and grief move him to pity, if not to love, 
and he again turns aside to say, 

'The true alone and loving sob like her. 
Come, Helen !" (He takes her hand.) 

Helen. Oh, let never Greek see this ! 

Hide me from Argos, from Amy'clas 2 hide'me, 
Hide me from all. 

Menelaus. Thy anguish is too strong 

For me to strive with. 

Helen - Leave it all to me. 

Menelaus. Peace ! peace ! The wind, I hope, is fair for Sparta. 

The intimation, by Landor and others who have sought 
to exculpate Helen, that she was unwillingly borne away 

1 Jupiter was fabled to be the father of Helen 

2 A town of Laconia, where was a temple of Apollo. It was a short 
distance to the south-west of Sparta. as a sll0rt 



114 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

by Paris, has been amplified, with much poetic skill and 
beauty, by a recent poet, 1 into the story that the god- 
dess Yenus appeared to her, and, while Helen was shrink- 
ing with apprehension and fear of her power, told her 
that she should fall into a deep slumber, and on awaking 
should be oblivious of her past life, "ignorant of shame, 
and blameless of those evil deeds that the goddess should 
thrust upon her." Yenus declares to her : 

" Thou art the toy of gods, an instrument 

Wherewith ail mortals shall be plagued or blest, 

Even at my pleasure ; yea, thou shalt be bent 
This way and that, howe'er it like me best : 
And following thee, as tides the moon, the West 

Shall flood the Eastern coasts with waves of war, 
And thy vexed soul shall scarcely be at rest, 

Even in the havens where the deathless are. 

" The instruments of men are blind and dumb, 

And this one gift I give thee, to be blind 
And heedless of the thing that is to come, 

And ignorant of that which is behind ; 

Bearing an innocent, forgetful mind 
In each new fortune till I visit thee 

And stir thy heart, as lightning and the wind 
Bear fire and tumult through a sleeping sea. 

" Thou shalt forget Hermione ! forget, 

Forget thy lord, thy lofty palace, and thy kin ; 
Thy hand within a stranger's shalt thou set, 

And follow him, nor deem it any sin ; 

And many a strange land wand'ring shalt thou win ; 
And thou shalt come to an unhappy town, 

And twenty long years shalt thou dwell therein, 
Before the Argives mar its towery crown. 



i A. Lang, in his "Helen of Troy." 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 115 

" And of thine end I speak not, but thy name — 

Thy name which thou lamentest — that shall be 
A song in all men's speech, a tongue of flame 

Between the burning lips of Poesy ; 

And the nine daughters of Mnemos'y-ne, 
With Prince Apollo, leader of the nine, 

Shall make thee deathless in their minstrelsy ! 
Yea, for thou shalt outlive the race divine." 

As the goddess had declared, so it came to pass, for 
when Helen awoke from her long slumber 

She had no memory of unhappy things, 

She knew not of the evil days to come, 
Forgotten were her ancient wanderings ; 

And as Lethae'an waters wholly numb 

The sense of spirits in Elysium, 
That no remembrance may their bliss alloy, 

Even so the rumor of her days was dumb, 
And all her heart was ready for new joy. 

The reconciliation of Menelaus with Helen is easily 
effected by the same kind of artifice ; for when, on the 
taking of Troy, he meets her and draws his sword to 
slay her, the goddess, again appearing, throws her witch- 
ing spell over him also : 

Then fell the ruthless sword that never fell 
When spear bit harness in the battle din, 

For Aphrodi'te spake, and like a spell 

Wrought her sweet voice persuasive, till within 
His heart there lived no memory of sin ■ 

No thirst for vengeance more, but all grew plain, 
And wrath was molten in desire to win 

The golden heart of Helen once ao-ain. 

It is said that after the death of JVIenelaus Helen was 
driven from the Peloponnesus by the indignant Spartans. 



116 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

IV. ARTS AND CIVILIZATION IN THE HEROIC AGE. 

Although but little confidence can be placed in the 
reality of the persons and events mentioned in the 
poems of Homer, yet there is one kind of truth from 
which the poet can hardly have deviated, or his writings 
would not have been so acceptable as they evidently 
were to his contemporaries— and that is, a faithful por- 
traiture of the government, usages, institutions, man- 
ners, and general condition of the Greeks during the age 
in which he lived, and which undoubtedly differed little 
from the manners and customs of the Heroic Age. The 
pictures of life and character that lie had drawn must 
have had a reality of existence, and they unquestionably 
give us, to a considerable extent, a true insight into the 
condition of Grecian society at that early period of the 

world's history. 

And yet we must bear in mind that epics such as 
those of Homer, describing the manners and customs of 
a half-barbarous age, ancfinteiided to honor chieftains 
by extolling the deeds and lives of their ancestors, and 
to be recited in the courts of kings and princes, would, 
very naturally, be accommodated to the wishes, partial- 
ities, and prejudices of their noble hearers. And this 
leads us to consider how far even the great epic of 
Homer is to be relied on for a faithful picture of the 
political life of the Greeks during the Heroic Age. We 
quote the following suggestive remarks on this subject 
from a recent writer and able Greek critic : 

THE POLITICAL LIFE OF THE GREEKS, AS REPRESENTED IN 

THEIR GREAT EPICS. 

"Although, in the Greek epics, the rank and file of 
the army are to be marshalled by the kings, and to raise 
the shout of battle, they actually disappear from the ac- 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 117 

tion, and leave the field perfectly clear for the chiefs to 
perform their deeds of valor. There is not, perhaps, an 
example in all the Iliad of a chief falling, or even being 
wounded, by an ignoble hand. Amid the cloud of mis- 
siles that were flying on the plains of Troy, amid the 
crowd of chiefs and kings that were marshalled on either 
side, we never hear how a 'certain man drew a bow at 
a venture, and smote a king between the joints of the 
harness.' Yet this must necessarily have' occurred in 
any prolonged combats such as those about the walls of 
Troy. 

"Here, then, is a plain departure from truth, and 
even from reasonable probability. It is indeed a mere 
omission which does not offend the reader; but such 
inaccuracies suggest serious reflections. If the epic 
poets ignore the importance of the masses on the battle- 
field, is it not likely that they underrate it in the public 
assemblies? Is it not possible that here too, to please 
their patrons, they describe the glorious ages of the past 
as the days when the assembled people would not ques- 
tion the superior wisdom of their betters, but merely 
assembled to be taught and to applaud? I cannot, 
therefore, as Mr. Grote does, accept the political condi- 
tion of things in the Homeric poems, especially in the 
Iliad, as a safe guide to the political life of Greece in 
the poet's own day. 

"The figure of Thersites seems drawn with special 
spite and venom, as a satire upon the first critics that 
rose up among the assembled people to question the 
divine right of kings to do wrong. We may be sure 
the real Thersites, from whom the poet drew his pict- 
ure, was a very different and a far more serious power 
in debate than the misshapen buffoon of the Iliad, But 
the king who had been thwarted and exposed by him 
in the day would, over his cups in the evening, enjoy 



118 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the poet's travesty, and long for the good old times 
when he could put down all impertinent criticism by 
the stroke of his knotty sceptre. The Homeric Agora 
could hardly have existed had it been so idle a form as 
the poets represent. But as the lower classes were care- 
fully marshalled on the battle-field, from a full sense of 
the importance which the poet denies them, so they were 
marshalled in the public assembly, where we may be sure 
their weight told with equal effect, though the poet neg- 
lected it for the greater glory of the counselling chiefs." 1 
Notwithstanding all this, as Heeren says, " Homer is the 
best source of information that we possess respecting the 

Heroic Age." 

The form of government that prevailed among the 
early Greeks, especially after the Pelasgic race had 
yielded to the more warlike and adventurous Hellenes, 
was evidently that of the kingly order, on a democratic 
basis, although it is difficult to ascertain the precise ex- 
tent of the royal prerogatives. In all the Grecian states 
there appears to have been an hereditary class of chiefs 
or nobles, distinguished from the common freemen or 
people by titles of honor, superior wealth, dignity, valor, 
and noble birth ; which latter implied no less than a de- 
scent from the gods themselves, to whom every princely 
house seems to have traced its origin. 

But the kings, although generally hereditary, were 
not always so, nor were they absolute monarchs ; they 
were rather the most eminent of the nobility, having 
the command in war, and the chief seat in the adminis- 
tration of justice ; and their authority was more or less 
extended in proportion to the noble qualities they pos- 
sessed, and particularly to their valor in battle. Unless 
distinguished by courage and strength, kings could not 

i "Social Life in Greece, from Homer to Menander," by Rev. J. P. 
Mahaffy. 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 119 

even command in time of war; and during peace they 
were bound to consult the people in all important mat- 
ters. Among their pecuniary advantages were the prof- 
its of an extensive domain which seems to have been 
attached to the royal office, and not to have been the 
private property of the individual. Thus, Homer rep- 
resents Telem'aehus as in danger not only of losing his 
throne by the adverse choice of the people, but also, 
among the rights of the crown, the domains of Ulysses, 
his father, should he not be permitted to succeed him. 1 

During the Heroic Age the Greeks appear to have 
had no tixed laws established by legislation. Public 
opinion and usage, confirmed and expounded by judi- 
cial decisions, were the only sources to which the weak 
and injured could look for protection and redress. -Pri- 
vate differences were most often settled by private 
means, and in these cases the weak and deserving were 
generally plundered and maltreated by the powerful 
and guilty ; but in quarrels that threatened to disturb 
the peace of the community the public compelled the 
injured party to accept, and the aggressor to pay, a 
stipulated compensation. As among the savage tribes 
of America, and even among our early Saxon ances- 
tors, the murderer was often allowed to pay a stipulated 
compensation, which stayed the spirit of revenge, and 
was received as a full expiation of his guilt. The mu- 
tual dealings of the several independent Grecian states 
with one another were regulated by no established prin- 
ciples, and international law had no existence at this 
early period. 

DOMESTIC LIFE AND CHARACTER. 

In the domestic relations of life there was much in 
the conduct of the Greeks that was meritorious. Chil- 



Sce the Odyssey (Cowper's Trans.), xi., 207-223. 



120 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

dren were treated with affection, and much care was 
bestowed on their education ; and, on the other hand, 
the respect which they showed their parents, even after 
the period of youth and dependence, approached almost 
to veneration. As evidence of a rude age, however, the 
father disposed of his daughter's hand in marriage with 
absolute authority; and although we meet with many 
models of conjugal affection, as in the noble characters 
of Andromache and Penelope, yet the story of Helen, 
and other similar ones, suggest too plainly that the 
faithlessness of the wife was not regarded as a very 
great offence. The wife, however, occupied a station of 
as much, if not more influence in the family than was 
the case in the historical period ; but she was not the 
equal of her husband, and even Homer portrays none of 
those feelings of love which result from a higher regard 
for the female sex. 

We gather from Homer that there was a low sense of 

truth among the Greeks of the Homeric Age, but that 

the people were better than might be expected from the 

examples set them by the gods in whom they professed 

to believe. Says Mahaffy: "At no period did the 

nation attain to that high standard which is the great 

feature in Germanic civilization. Even the Komans, 

with all their coarseness and vulgarity, stood higher in 

this respect. But neither in the Iliad nor the Odyssey 

is there, except in phrases, any reprobation of deceit as 

such. To deceive an enemy is meritorious ; to deceive 

a stranger, innocent ; to deceive even a friend, perfectly 

/( unobjectionable, if any object is to be gained. So it is 

remarked of Menelaus— as it were, exceptionally— that 

he will tell the truth if you press him, for he is very 

considerate. But the really leading characters in the 

Odyssey and Iliad (except Achilles) do not hesitate at 

all manner of lying. Ulysses is perpetually inventing, 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 121 

and so is his patroness, Pallas Athe'ne; and she actu- 
ally mentions this quality of wily deceit as her special 
ground of love and affection for him." Thus, we read 
in the Odyssey that when Ulysses, in response to what 
the goddess— then disguised and unknown to him— had 
said, 

With unembarrassed readiness returned 
Not truth, but figments to truth opposite, 
For guile, in him, stood never at a pause— 

the goddess, seemingly well pleased with his "tricks of 
speech delusive," thus replied : 

"Who passes thee in artifice well-framed, 

And in impostures various, need shall find 

Of all his policy, although a god. 

Canst thou not cease, inventive as thou art 

And subtle, from the wiles which thou hast loved 

Since thou wast infant, and from tricks of speech 

Delusive, even in thy native land? 

But come; dismiss we these ingenious shifts 

From our discourse, in which we both excel ; 

For thou of all men in expedients most 

Abound'st and eloquence, and I throughout 

All heaven have praise for wisdom and for art." 

Cowper's Trans. 

To the foregoing it may be added that « Zeus deceives 
both gods and men ; the other gods deceive Zeus ; in fact, 
the whole Homeric society is full of guile and falsehood. 
There is still, however, an expectation that if the gods 
are called to witness a transaction by means of an oath, 
they will punish deceit. The poets clearly held that the 
gods, if they were under no restraint or fear of punish- 
ment from Zeus, were at liberty to deceive as they liked. 
One safeguard yet remained— the oath by the Styx, 1 the 



1 See the Index at the end of the volume. 

6 



rf 



122 MOSAICS OF GEECIAN HISTORY. 

penalties of violating which are enumerated in Hesiod's 
Tkeogwuy, and consist of nine years' transportation, with 
solitary confinement and hard labor. As for oaths, the 
Hymn to Hermes shows that in succeeding generations 
their solemnity was openly ridiculed. Among the Ho- 
meric gods, as well as among the heroes, there were, 
indeed, old-fashioned characters who adhered to probity. 
The character of Apollo is unstained by deceit. So is 
that of Menelaus." 

The Greeks in the Heroic Age were divided into the 
three classes— nobles, freemen, and slaves. Of the first 
we have already spoken. The condition of the freemen 
it is difficult to fully ascertain ; but the majority pos- 
sessed portions of land which they cultivated. There 
was another class of freemen who possessed no property, 
and who worked for hire on the property of others. 
" Among the freemen," says one writer, " we find cer- 
tain professional persons whose acquirements and knowl- 
edge raised them above their class, and procured for them 
the respect and society of the nobles. Such were the 
seer, the bard, the herald, and likewise the smith and 
the carpenter." The slaves were owned by the nobles 
alone, and were treated with far more kindness and con- 
sideration than were the slaves of republican Greece. 

During this period the Greeks had but little knowl- 
edge of geography beyond the confines of Greece and 
its^islands and the coasts of the ^Egean Sea. The hab- 
itable world was supposed to be surrounded by an ocean- 
like river, like that which Homer describes as bordering 
the shield of Achilles, beyond which were realms of 
darkness, dreams, and death. Legitimate commerce 
appears to have been deemed of little importance. The 
largest ships were slender, half-decked row-boats, capa- 
ble of carrying, at most, only about a hundred men, and 
having a movable mast, which was hoisted, and a sail 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 123 

attached, only to take advantage of a favorable wind. 
Most of the navigation at this early period was under- 
taken for the purposes of plunder, and piracy was not 
deemed dishonorable. When Mentor and Telemachus 
came to the court of Nestor, that prince, after entertain- 
ing them kindly, asked them, as a matter of curiosity, 
whether they were travellers or robbers ! 

But the Heroic Age was not one essentially rude and 
barbarous. Greece was then a populous and well-cultiva- 
ted country, with numerous and large cities surrounded 
by walls and adorned with palaces and temples. Homer 
describes the different branches of agriculture, and the 
various labors of farming, the culture of the grape, and 
the duties of the herdsmen. The weaving of woollen 
and of linen fabrics was the chief occupation of the 
women, and was carried to a high degree of perfection. 
While Homer may have drawn largely upon his imagi- 
nation for his brilliant pictures, still their main features 
were undoubtedly taken from life, and many ancient 
remains of Grecian art attest the general fidelitv of his 
representations. In the wonderful description of the 
shield of Achilles we get some insight into the progress 
which the arts of metallurgy and engraving had made, 
and in the following description, in the Fifth Book of 
the Odyssey, of the raft of Ulysses, on which this wander- 
ing hero floated after leaving Calypso's isle, we learn to 
what degree the art of ship-building had attained in the 
Heroic Age. Calypso furnishes him the material for 
constructing his raft. 

The Baft of Ulysses. 

She gave him, fitted to the grasp, an axe 
Of iron, ponderous, double-edged, with haft 
Of olive-wood inserted firm, and wrought 
With curious art. Then placing in bis hand 



124 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

A polished adze, she led herself the way 

To her isle's utmost verge, where loftiest stood 

The alder, poplar, and cloud-piercing fir, 

Though sapless, sound, and fittest for his use, 

As buoyant most. To that most verdant grove 

His steps the beauteous nymph Calypso led, 

And sought her home again. Then slept not he, 

But, swinging with both hands the axe, his task 

Soon finished ; trees full twenty to the ground 

He cast ; which, dexterous, with his adze he smoothed, 

The knotted surface chipping by a line. 

Meantime the lovely goddess to his aid 

Sharp augers brought, with which he bored the beams, 

Then placed them side by side, adapting each. 

To other, and the seams with wadding closed. 

Broad as an artist, skilled in naval works, 

The bottom of a ship of burden spreads, 

Such breadth Ulysses to his raft assigned. 

He decked her over with long planks, upborne 

On massy beams; he made the mast, to which 

He added suitable the yard ; he framed 

Rudder and helm to regulate her course ; 

With wicker-work he bordered all her length 

For safety, and much ballast stowed within. 

Meantime Calypso brought him for a sail 

Fittest materials, which he also shaped, 

And to his sail due furniture annexed 

Of cordage strong, foot-ropes and ropes aloft, 

Then heaved her down with levers to the deep. 

Odyssey, B. V. Cowper's Trans. 

We notice in this description the use of the adze — of 
the double-edged axe ; of augers for boring the beams ; 
the calking of the hull; the decking made of planks; 
the single mast ; the yard from which the sail was 
spread ; the use of the rudder and the helm ; " foot-ropes 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 125 

and ropes aloft ;" while, for safety, a wicker-work of 
cordage surrounds the deck, and much "ballast" is 
stowed within. 

To what extent the higher orders of art— those which 
became in later times the highest glory of Greece, and 
in which she will always stand unrivalled— were culti- 
vated before the time of Homer, is a subject of much 
uncertainty. It is clear, however, that poetry and music, 
which were almost inseparably united, were early made 
prominent instruments of the religious, martial, and polit- 
ical education of the people. The aid of poetical song 
was called in to enliven and adorn the banquets of the 
great public assemblies, the Olympic and other games, 
and scarcely a social or public gathering can be men- 
tioned that would not have appeared to the ardent Gre- 
cians cold and spiritless without this accompaniment. 

It is not equally clear, however, whether architecture, 
in Homer's time, had arrived at such a stage as to de- 
serve a place among the fine arts. But it is probable 
that while the private dwellings which the poet describes 
were strong and convenient rather than ornamental and 
elegant in design, the public buildings — the temples, 
palaces, etc.— were elegant in design and in architectural 
decoration. Statuary was cultivated in this age, as ap- 
pears from the remains of many of the Greek cities; and, 
although no paintings are spoken of in Homer, yet his 
descriptions prove that his contemporaries must have 
been acquainted with the art of design. 'Whether the 
Greeks were acquainted at this early period with the 
art of writing is, perhaps, the most important of all the 
questions connected with the progress of art and knowl- 
edge at this time, as it has received the most attention. 
The prevalent opinion is that the art of writing was 
then unknown, and that no written compositions & were 
extant until many years after the time of Homer. 



126 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



Y. THE CONQUEST OF THE PELOPONNESUS, AND COLONIES 

IN ASIA MINOR. 

Although not yet fully out of the fabulous era of 
Grecian history, we now enter upon a period when the 
crude fictions of more than mortal heroes begin to give 
place to the realities of human existence ; but still the 
vague, disputed, and often contradictory annals on which 
we are obliged to rely shed only an uncertain light 
around us; and even what we can gather as the most 
reliable cannot be taken wholly as undoubted historic 
truth. 

The immediate consequences of the Trojan war, as 
represented by Greek historians, were scarcely less dis- 
astrous to the victors than to the vanquished. The re- 
turn of the Grecian heroes to their homes is repre- 
sented, as we have seen, to have been full of tragical 
adventures, and their long absence encouraged usurpers 
to seize many of their thrones. Hence arose fierce wars 
and intestine commotions, which greatly retarded the 
progress of Grecian civilization. Among these petty 
revolutions, however, no events of general interest oc- 
curred until about sixty years after the fall of Troy, 
when a people from Epi'rus, passing over the mountain- 
chain of Pindus, descended into the rich plains which 
lie along the banks of the Pene'us, and finally con- 
quered the country, to which they gave the name of 
Thessaly. The fugitives from Thessaly, driven from 
their own country, passed over into Bceo'tia, which they 
subdued after a long struggle, in their turn driving out 
the ancient inhabitants of the land. This event is sup- 
posed to have occurred in 1124 b.c. 

The unsettled state of society caused by the Thessa- 
lian and Boeotian conquests occasioned what is known 
as the "iEo'lian Migration," so-called from the race that 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 127 

took the principal share in it. These people passed over 
into Asia Minor, and established their settlements in the 
vicinity of the ruins of Troy. This became known as 
the ^Eolian Confederacy. 

RETURN OF THE HERACLI'DjE. 

About twenty years after the Thessalian conquest, 
the Dorians, who had frequently changed their homes, 
and had finally settled in a mountainous region on the 
south of Thessaly, commenced a migration to the Pelo- 
ponnesus, accompanied by portions of other tribes, and 
led, as was asserted, by descendants of Hercules, who 
had been deprived of their dominions in the latter coun- 
try, and who had hitherto made several unsuccessful 
attempts to recover them. This important event in 
Grecian history is therefore called the " Eeturn of the 
Heraclidae." The Dorians could muster about twenty 
thousand fighting men ; and although they were greatly 
inferior in numbers to the inhabitants of the country 
they invaded, the whole of Peloponnesus, except a few 
districts, was subdued and apportioned among the con- 
querors. Of the Heraclidae, Tem'enus received Argos, 
the sons of Aristode'mus obtained Sparta, and Cres- 
phon'tes was given Messe'nia. Some of the uncon- 
quered tribes of the southern part of the peninsula 
seized upon the province of Acha'ia, and expelled its 
Ionian inhabitants. The latter sought a retreat on the 
western coast of Asia Minor, south of the ^Eolian cities, 
and the settlements thus formed received the name of 
Ionia. At a still later period, bands of the Dorians, 
not content with their conquest of the Peloponnesus, 
thronged to Asia Minor, where they peopled several cit- 
ies south of Ionia ; so that the JSgean Sea was finally 
circled by Grecian settlements, and its islands covered 
with them. 



1 



128 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The Dorians did not become undisputed masters of 
the Peloponnesus until they had conquered Corinth in 
the next generation. The capture of Corinth was at- 
tended by another expedition which drew the Dorians 
north of the Isthmus. They invaded Attica, and en- 
camped before the walls of Athens. Before proceeding 
to attack the city they consulted the oracle at Delphi 
— the most remarkable oracle of the ancient world, of 
which the poet Ltj'can thus writes : 

The listening god, still ready with replies, 
To none his aid or oraele denies ; 
Yet wise, and righteous ever, scorns to hear 
The fool's fond wishes, or the guilty's prayer ; 
Though vainly in repeated vows they trust, 
None e'er find grace before him but the just. 
Oft to a banished, wandering, houseless race 
The sacred dictates have assigned a place : 
Oft from the strong he saves the weak in war, 
And heals the barren land, and pestilential air. 

The Dorians were told by the oracle that they would 
be successful as long as the Athenian king, Co'drus, was 
uninjured. The latter, being informed of the answer 
of the oracle, disguised himself as a peasant, and, go- 
ing forth from the city, was met and slain by a Dorian 
soldier, thus sacrificing himself for his country's good. 
The superstitious Dorians, now deeming the war hope- 
less, withdrew from Attica ; and the Athenians, out of 
respect for Codrus, declared that no one was worthy 
to succeed him, and abolished the form of royalty alto- 
gether. Magistrates called Archons were first appointed 
for life from the family of Codrus, and these were 
finally exchanged for others appointed for ten years. 
These and other successive encroachments on the royal 
prerogatives resulted in the establishment of an aristo- 



THE FABULOUS AND LEGENDARY PERIOD. 129 

cratical government of the nobility, and are almost the 
only events that fill the meagre annals of Athens for 
several centuries. 

The foundation of the Greek colonies in Asia Minor 
may be said to form the conclusion of the Mythical 
Period of Grecian history, and likewise to furnish the 
basis for the earlier forms of authentic Greek literature. 
Before proceeding, therefore, to the general events that 
distinguish the authentic period of Greek history, we 
will give, first, a brief sketch of this early literature as 
embodied chiefly in the poems of Homer; and, second, 
will point out some of the causes that tended to unite 
the Greeks as a people, notwithstanding their separation 
into so many independent communities or states. 

6* 






130 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTEK III. 

EARLY GREEK LITERATURE, AND GREEK COMMUNITY 

OF INTERESTS. 

The earliest written compositions of the Greeks, of 
which tradition or history has preserved any record, 
were poetical; a circumstance which, noticed in other 
nations also, has led to the assertion that poetry is pre- 
eminently the language of Nature. But the first poet- 
ical compositions of the Greeks were not written. The 
earliest of them were undoubtedly the religious teach- 
ings of the priests and seers ; and these were soon fol- 
lowed by others founded on the legends and genealogies 
of the Grecian heroes, which were addressed, by their 
authors, to the ear and feelings of a sympathizing audi- 
ence, and were then taken up by professional reciters, 
called Ehapsodists, who travelled from place to place, 
rehearsing them before private companies or at the pub- 
lic festivals. 

Of the Greek colonists of Asia the Ionians possessed 
the highest culture, and with them we find the first de- 
velopment of Greek poetry. Drawing from the com- 
mon language a richer tone and a clearness and graphic 
power that their neighbors never equalled, they early 
unfolded the ancient legends and genealogies of the 
race into new and enlarged forms of poetical beauty. 
Says Dr. C. C. Felton, 1 " In Ionia the popular enthu- 
siasm took a poetical turn, and the genius of that richly 
gifted race responded nobly to the call. The poets— 



i "Lectures on Ancient and Modern Greece, 1 ' vol. i., p. 78. 



EARLY GREEK LITERATURE. 131 

singers as they were first called — found in the orally 
transmitted ballads the richest mines of legendary lore, 
which they wrought into new forms of rhythmical 
beauty and splendor. Instead of short ballads, pieces 
of great length, with more fully developed characters 
and more of dramatic action, were required by a beauty 
loving and pleasure seeking race; and the leisure of 
peace and the demands of refined luxury furnished the 
occasion and the impelling motive to this more extended 
species of epic song." From the highly esteemed work 
of Dr. Felton we transcribe some observations on the 
beauties of the Ionian dialect, and on the poetical taste 
and ingenuity that finally developed the immortal epics 
of Homer : 

Ionian Language and Culture. 
"The Ionian dialect, remoulded from the Asiatic 
forms and elements which had travelled through the 
North and recrossed the .zEgean Sea, under theliappy 
influences of a serene and beautiful heaven, amid the 
most varied and lovely scenery in nature, by a people 
of manly vigor and exquisite mental and physical or- 
ganization—of the keenest susceptibility to beauty of 
sound as well as of form, of the most vivid and creative 
imagination, combined with a childlike impulsiveness 
and simplicity— this Ionian language, so sprung and so 
nurtured, attained a descriptive force, a copiousness and 
harmony, which made it the most admirable instrument 
on which poet ever played. For every mood of mind, 
every shade of passion, every affection of the heart' 
every form and aspect of the outward world, it had its 
graphic phrase, its clear, appropriate, and rich expres- 
sion. Its pictured words and sentences placed the 
things described, and thoughts that breathe, in living 
form before the reader's eye and mind. It was vivid 



132 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

rich, melodious; in its general character strikingly con- 
crete and objective ; a charm to the ear, a delight to the 
imagination ; copious and infinitely flexible ; free and 
graceful in movement and structure, having at the be- 
ginning passed over the chords of the lyre, and been 
modulated by the living voice of the singer; obeying 
the impulse of thought and feeling, rather than the 
formal principles of grammar. 

" It expressed the passions of robust manhood with 
artless and unconscious truth. Its freedom, its voluble 
minuteness of delineation, its rapid changes of construc- 
tion, its breaks, pauses, significant and sudden transi- 
tions, its easy irregularities, exhibit the intellectual play 
of national youth ; while in boldness and splendor it 
meets the demands of highest invention and the most 
majestic sweep of the imagination, and bears the im- 
press of genius in the full strength of its maturity. 
Frederic Jacobs says, fancifully yet truly, that ' the lan- 
guage of Ionia resembles the smooth mirror of a broad 
and silent lake, from whose depth a serene sky, with its 
soft and sunny vault, and the varied nature along its smil- 
ing shores are reflected in transfigured beauty.' In Ionia, 
to borrow the expressions of the same eloquent writer, 
the mind of man ' enjoyed a life exempt from drudgery, 
among fair festivals and solemn assemblies, full of sen- 
sibility and frolic joy, innocent curiosity and childlike 
faith. Surrendered to the outer world, and inclined to 
all that was attractive by novelty, beauty, and greatness, 
it was here that the people listened, with greatest eager- 
ness, to the history of the men and heroes whose deeds, 
adventures, and wanderings filled a former age with 
their renown, and, when they were echoed in song, 
moved to ecstasy the breasts of the hearers.' 

*.*.*" The Ionians had from the beginning a supe- 
rior natural endowment for literature and art ; and when 



EARLY GREEK LITERATURE. 133 

this most gifted race came into contact with the antique 
culture and boundless commercial wealth of Asia and 
Africa, the loveliest and most fragrant flowers of the 
intellect shot forth in every direction. Carrying with 
them the traditions of their race and the war-songs of 
their bards to the very scenes where the famous deeds 
of their forefathers had been performed, these local 
circumstances awakened a fresh interest in the old le- 
gends, and epic poetry took a new start, a bolder char- 
acter, a loftier sweep, a wider range. A general ex- 
pansion of the intellectual powers and the poetical spirit 
suddenly took place in the midst of the new prosperity 
and the unaccustomed luxuries of the East— in the midst 
of the gay and festive life which succeeded the ages of 
wandering, toil, hardship, and conflict, like the Sabbath 
repose following the weary warfare of the week. The 
loveliness of nature on the Ionian shores, and in the 
isles that crown the JSgean deep, was soon embellished 
by the genius of art. Stately processions, hymns chant- 
ed in honor of the gods, graceful dances before the al- 
tars, statues, and shrines, assemblies for festal or solemn 
purposes in the open air under the soft sky of Ionia, 
or within the halls of princes and nobles— these fill up 
the moments of the new and dazzling existence which 
the excitable Hellenic race are invited here and now 
to enjoy. 

"Their first and deepest want— that which, in the 
foregoing periods of their existence, had been the first 
supplied— was the longing of the heart, the demand of 
the imagination, for poetry and song; and it would have 
been surprising if the bright genius of Ionia, under all 
these favoring circumstances, had not broken upon the 
world with a splendor which outshone all its former 
achievements. Poets sprang up, obedient to the call, 
and a new school of poetical composition rapidly devel- 



134 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

oped itself, embodying the Hellenic traditions of the 
Trojan story, and the legends handed down by the Tro- 
jans themselves. Troops or companies of these poets — 
singers, as they were called — were formed, and their 
pieces were the delight of the listening multitudes that 
thronged around them. At last, among these minstrels 
who consecrated the flower of their lives to the service 
of the Muses, appeared a man whose genius was to 
eclipse them all. This man was Homer." 



I. HOMER AND HIS POEMS. 



Not only was Homer the greatest of the poets of 
antiquity, but he is generally admitted to be distin- 
guished before all competitors by a clear and even a 
vast superiority. The circumstances of his life are but 
little known, except that he was a wandering poet, and, 
in his later years at least, was blind. He is supposed 
to have lived nearly one thousand years before the 
Christian era; but, strange as it may seem, nothing is 
known, with certainty, of his parentage or his birthplace. 
Although he was probably a native of the island of 
-Chi'os, yet seven Grecian cities contended for the honor 
of his birth. In view of this controversy, and of the 
real doubt that hung over the subject, the poet Antip'- 
ater, of Sidon, who flourished just before the Christian 
era, as if he could not give to his great predecessor too 
high an exaltation, attributes his birthplace to heaven, 
and he ascribes to the goddess Calli'o-pe, one of the 
Muses, who presided over epic poetry and eloquence, 
the distinction of being his mother. 

From Col'ophon some deem thee sprung ; 

From Smyrna some, and some from Chios ; 
These noble Sal'amis have sung, 

While those proclaim thee born in Ios ; 



EARLY GREEK LITERATURE. 135 

And others cry up Thessaly, 

The mother of the Lap'ithae. 

Thus each to Homer has assigned 

The birthplace just which suits his mind. 

But if I read the volume right, 
By Phoebus to his followers given, 

I'd say they're all mistaken quite, 
And that his real country 's heaven ; 

"While, for his mother, she can be 

No other than Calliope. Trans, by Merivale. 

The principal works of Homer, and, in fact, the only 
ones that have not been declared spurious, are the Iliad 
and the Odyssey. The former, as we have seen, relates 
some of the circumstances of the closing year of the 
Trojan war ; and the latter tells the story of the wan- 
derings of the Grecian prince Ulysses after the fall of 
Troy. The ancients, to whom the writings of Homer 
were so familiar, fully believed that he was the author 
of the two great epics attributed to him. It was left to 
modern critics to maintain the contrary. In 1795 Pro- 
fessor F. A. Wolf, of Germany, published his Prolegom- 
ena^ or prefatory essay to the Iliad, in which he ad- 
vanced the hypothesis that both the Iliad and the 
Odyssey were a collection of separate lays by different 
authors, for the first time reduced to writing and formed 
into the two great poems by the despot Pisis'tratus, of 
Athens, and his friends. 1 We cannot here enter into 
the details of the controversy to which this theory has 
given rise, nor can we undertake to say on which side 

1 Nearly all the modern German writers follow the views of Wolf 
against the Homeric authorship of this poem, hut among the English 
critics there is more diversity of opinion. Colonel Mure, Mr. Gladstone, 
and others oppose the German view, while Grote, Professor Geddes, Pro- 
fessor Mahaffy and others of note adopt it, so far at least as to believe that 
Homer was not the sole author of the poems. 



186 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the weight of authority is to be found. The following 
extracts well express the views of those who adhere 
to the common theory on the subject. Professor Fel- 
ton thus remarks, in the preface to his edition of the 
Iliad: " For my own part I prefer to consider it, as we 
have received it from ancient editors, as one poem — the 
work of one author, and that author Homer, the first 
and greatest of minstrels. As I understand the Iliad, 
there is a unity of plan, a harmony of parts, a consist- 
ency among the different situations of the same charac- 
ter, which mark it as the production of one mind ; but 
of a mind as versatile as the forms of nature, the aspects 
of life, and the combinations of powers, propensities, 
and passions in man are various." 

On the same subject, the English author and critic, 
Thomas Noon Taleotjrd, makes these interesting ob- 
servations: "The hypothesis to which the antagonists 
of Homer's personality must resort, implies something 
far more wonderful than the theory which they im- 
pugn. They profess to cherish the deepest veneration 
for the genius displayed in the poems. They agree, 
also, in the antiquity usually assigned to them, and they 
make this genius and this antiquity the arguments to 
prove that one man could not have composed them. 
They suppose, then, that in a barbarous age, instead of 
one being marvellously gifted, there were many: a 
mighty race of bards, such as the world has never since 
seen — a number of miracles instead of one. All expe- 
rience is against this opinion. In various periods of the 
world great men have arisen, under very different cir- 
cumstances, to astonish and delight it; but that the in- 
tuitive power should be so strangely diffused, at any 
one period, among a great number, who should leave no 
successors behind them, is unworthy of credit. And we 
are requested to believe this to have occurred in an age 



EARLY GREEK LITERATURE. 137 

which those who maintain the theory regard as unfavor- 
able to poetic art ! The common theory, independent 
of other proofs, is the most probable. Since the early 
existence of the works cannot be doubted, it is easier to 
believe in one than in twenty Homers." 

Very numerous and varied are the characterizations 
of Homer and the writings ascribed to him. Pope, in 
his Temple of Fame, pays this tribute to the ancient 
bard : 

High on the list the mighty Horner shone ; 
Eternal adamant composed his throne; 
Father of verse ! in holy fillets dressed, 
His silver beard waved gently o'er his breast ; 
Though blind, a boldness in his look appears ; 
In years he seemed, but not impaired by years. 
The wars of Troy were round the pillars seen : 
Here fierce Tydi'des wounds the Cyprian queen ; 
Here Hector, glorious from Patro'clus' fall ; 
Here, dragged in triumph round the Trojan wall. 
Motion and life did every part inspire, 
Bold was the work, and proud the master's fire : 
A strong expression most he seemed to affect, 
And here and there disclosed a brave neglect. 

It is admitted by all that the Homeric characters are 
drawn, each in its way, by a master's hand. "The most 
pervading merit of the Iliad;' says one, "is its fidelity 
and vividness as a mirror of man, and of the visible 
sphere in which he lived, with its infinitely varied ima- 
gery, both actual and ideal; and the task which the 
great poet set for himself was perfectly accomplished." 
" The mind of Homer," says another, " is like an iEolian 
harp, so finely strung that it answers to the faintest 
movement of the air by a proportionate vibration. With 
every stronger current its music rises along an almost 



138 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

immeasurable scale, which begins with the lowest and 
softest whisper, and ends in the full swell of the organ." 
The " lofty march " of the Iliad is also often spoken 
of as characteristic of the style in which that great epic 
is written. And yet, as has been said, "though its ver- 
sification is always appropriate, and therefore never 
mean, it only rises into stateliness, or into a terrible 
sublimity, when Homer has occasion to brace his ener- 
gies for an effort. Thus he ushers in with true gran- 
deur the marshalling of the Greek army, in the Second 
Book, partly by the invocation of the Muses, and partly 
by an assemblage of no less than six consecutive similes, 
which describe, respectively— 1st, the flash of the Greek 
arms and the splendor of the Grecian hosts; 2d, the 
swarming numbers ; 3d, the resounding tramp ; 4th, the 
settling down of the ranks as they form the line; 5th, 
the busy marshalling by the commanders; 6th, the 
majesty of the great chief Agamemnon, Mike Mars or 
Neptune, such as Jove ordained him, eminent above all 
his fellow-chiefs.' " 

These similes are brought in with great effect as in- 
troductory to a catalogue of the ships and forces of the 
Greeks; thus pouring, from a single point, a broad 
stream of splendor over the whole ; and although the 
enumeration which follows is only a plain matter of 
business, it is not without its poetical embellishment, 
and is occasionally relieved by short legends of the 
countries and noted warriors of the different tribes. We 
introduce these striking similes here as marked charac- 
teristics of the art of Homer, from whom, it is little 
exaggeration to say, a very large proportion of the simi- 
les of all subsequent writers have been, more or less 
directly, either copied or paraphrased. 

When it has been decided to lead the army to battle, 
the aged Nestor thus addresses Agamemnon : 



EARLY GREEK LITERATURE. 139 

"Now bid thy heralds sound the loud alarms, 
And call the squadrons sheathed in brazen arms ; 
Now seize the occasion, now the troops survey, 
And lead to war when heaven directs the way." 
He said : the monarch issued his commands ; 
Straight the loud heralds call the gathering bands: 
The chiefs enclose their king; the hosts divide, 
In tribes and nations ranked on either side. 

The appearance of the gathering hosts is then described 
in the following 

Similes. 

(1.) As on some mountain, through the lofty grove, 
The crackling flames ascend, and blaze above ; 
The fires expanding, as the winds arise, 
Shoot their long beams, and kindle half the skies ; 
So from the polished arms and brazen shields 
A gleamy splendor flashed along the fields. 

(2.) Not less their number than the embodied cranes, 
Or milk-white swans on A'sius' watery plains, 
That, o'er the windings of Ca-ys'ter's springs, 
Stretch their long necks, and clap their rustling wings ; 
Now tower aloft, and course in airy rounds, 
Now light with noise ; with noise the field resounds. 

(3.) Thus numerous and confused, extending wide, 
The legions crowd Scamander's floweiy side ; 
With rushing troops the plains are covered o'er, 
And thundering footsteps shake the sounding shore. 

(4.) Along the river's level meads they stand, 

Thick as in spring the flowers adorn the land, 
Or leaves the trees ; or thick as insects play, 
The wandering nation of a summer's day, 
That, drawn by milky streams, at evening hours, 
In gathered swarms surround the rural bowers; 
From pail to pail with busy murmur run 
The gilded legions, glittering in the sun. 



140 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

So thronged, so close the Grecian squadrons stood 
In radiant arms, athirst for Trojan blood. 

(5.) Each leader now his scattered force conjoins 
In close array, and forms the deepening lines. 
Not with more ease the skilful shepherd swain 
Collects his flocks from thousands on the plain. 

(6.) The king of kings, majestically tall, 

Towers o'er his armies, and outshines them all ; 
Like some proud bull, that round the pastures leads 
His subject herds, the monarch of the meads, 
Great as the gods, the exalted chief was seen, 
His chest like Neptune, and like Mars his mien ; 
Jove o'er his eyes celestial glories spread, 
And dawning conquest played around his head. 

Pope's Trans. 

Similes abound on nearly every page of the Iliad, 
and they are always appropriate to the subject. We 
select from them the following additional specimen, in 
which the brightness and number of the fires of the 
Trojans, in their encampment, are likened to the moon 
and* stars in their glory — when, as Cowper translates the 
fourth line, "not a vapor streaks the boundless blue." 

As when the moon, refulgent lamp of night, 
O'er heaven's blue azure spreads her sacred light, 
When not a breath disturbs the deep serene, 
And not a cloud o'ercasts the solemn scene ; 
Around her throne the vivid planets roll, 
And stars unnumbered gild the glowing pole, 
O'er the dark trees a yellow verdure shed, 
And tip with silver every mountain head ; 
Then shine the vales, the rocks in prospect rise, 
A flood of glory bursts from all the skies ; 
The conscious swains, rejoicing in the sight, 
Eye the blue vault, and bless the useful light; 



EARLY GREEK LITERATURE. 141 

So many fires before proud Ilion blaze, 

And lighten glimmering Xanthus with their rays. 

Iliad, B. VIII. Pope's Trans. 

Sheffield, Duke of Buckingham, is said to have de- 
clared of the two great epics of Homer: 

Read Homer once, and you can read no more, 
For all books else appear so mean, so poor ; 
Verse will seem prose ; but still persist to read, 
And Homer will be all the books you need. 

The following characterization, from the pen of Henry 
Nelson Coleridge, is both true and pleasing : 

" There are many hearts and minds to which one of 
these matchless poems will be more delightful than the 
other; there are many to which both will give equal 
pleasure, though of different kinds ; but there can hardly 
be a person, not utterly averse to the Muses, who will be 
quite insensible to the manifold charms of one or the 
other. The dramatic action of the Iliad may command 
attention where the diffused narrative of the Odyssey 
would fail to do so ; but how can any one, who loves 
poetry under any shape, help yielding up his soul to the 
virtuous siren -singing of Genius and Truth, which is 
forever resounding from the pages of either of these 
marvellous and truly immortal poems? In the Iliad 
will be found the sterner lessons of public justice or 
public expedience, and the examples are for statesmen 
and generals; in the Odyssey we are taught the maxims 
of private prudence and individual virtue, and the in- 
stances are applicable to all mankind : in both, Hon- 
esty, Veracity, and Fortitude are commended, and set up 
for imitation ; in both, Treachery, Falsehood, and Cow- 
ardice are condemned, and exposed for our scorn and 
avoidance. 

"Born, like the river of Egypt, in secret light, these 



142 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

poems yet roll on their great collateral streams, wherein 
a thousand poets have bathed their sacred heads, and 
thence drunk beauty and truth, and all sweet and no- 
ble harmonies. Known to no man is the time or place 
of their gushing forth from the earth's bosom, but their 
course has been among the fields and by the dwellings 
of men, and our children now sport on their banks and 
quaff their salutary waters. Of all the Greek poetry, I, 
for one, have no hesitation in saying that the Iliad and 
the Odyssey are the most delightful, and have been the 
most instructive works to me ; there is a freshness about 
them both which never fades, a truth and sweetness 
which charmed me as a boy and a youth, and on which, 
if I attain to it, I count largely for a soothing recreation 
in my old age." 

II. SOME CAUSES OF GREEK UNITY. 

| The natural causes which tended to unite the Greeks 
as a people were a common descent, a common language, 
and a common religion. Greek genius led the nation to 
trace its origin, where historical memory failed, to fabu- 
lous persons sprung from the earth or the gods; and 
under the legends of primitive and heroic ancestors 
lie the actual migrations and conquests of rude bands 
sprung from related or allied tribes. These poetical 
tales, accepted throughout Hellas as historical, convinced 
the people of a common origin. Thus the Greeks 
had a common share in the renown of their ancient 
heroes, upon whose achievements or lineage the claims 
of families to hereditary authority, and of states to the 
leadership of confederacies, were grounded. The pride 
or the ambition of political rivals led to the gradual 
embellishment of these traditions, and ended in ances- 
tral worship. Thus Attica had a temple to Theseus, the 



CAUSES OF GREEK UNITY. 143 

Ionian hero; the shrine of iEsculapius at Epidau'rus 
was famous throughout the classic world ; and the ex- 
ploits of Hercules were commemorated by the Dorians 
at the tomb of a Ne'mean king. When the bard and 
the playwright clothed these tales in verse, all Greece 
hearkened; and when the painter or the sculptor took 
these subjects for his skill, all Greece applauded. Thus 
was strengthened the national sense of fraternal blood. 

The possession of a common speech is so great a 
means of union, that the Komans imposed the Latin 
tongue on all public business and official records, even 
where Greek was the more familiar language; and the 
Mediaeval Church displayed her unity by the use of 
Latin in every bishopric on all occasions of public wor- 
ship. A language not only makes the literature em- 
bodied in it the heritage of all who speak it, but it dif- 
fuses among them the subtle genius which has shaped 
its growth. The lofty regard in which the Greeks held 
their own musical and flexible language is illustrated 
by an anecdote of Themis'tocles, who put to death the 
interpreter of a Persian embassy to Athens because he 
dared "to use the Greek tongue to utter the demands 
of the barbarian king." From Col'chis to Spain some 
Grecian dialect attested the extent and the unity of the 
Hellenic race. 

The Greek institutions of religion were still more 
powerful instruments of unity. It was the genius of 
a race destitute of an organized priesthood, and not the 
fancy of the poet, which animated nature by personify- 
ing its forces. Zeus was the all-embracing heavens, the 
father of gods and men ; Neptune presided over the 
seas; Deme'ter gave the harvest; Juno was the goddess 
of reproduction, and Aphrodi'te the patroness of love; 
while Apollo represented the joy-inspiring orb of day. 
The same imagination raised the earth to sentient life 



144 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

by assigning Dryads to the trees, Naiads to the foun- 
tains and brooks, O're-ads to the hills, Ner'e-ids to the 
seas, and Satyrs to the fields ; and in this many-sided 
and devout sympathy with nature the imagination and 
reverence of all Greece found expression. But Greek 
religion in its temples, its oracles, its games, and its 
councils, provided more tangible bonds of union than 
those of sentiment. Each city had its tutelary deity, 
whose temple was usually the most beautiful building 
in it, and to which any Greek might have access to 
make his offering or prayer. The sacred precincts were 
not to be profaned by those who were polluted with un- 
expiated crime, nor by blood, nor by the presence of the 
dead. Hence the temples of Greece were places of ref- 
uge for those who would escape from private or judicial 
vengeance. The more famous oracles of Greece were 
at Dodoma, at Delphi, at Lebade'a in Bceotia, and at 
Epidaurus in Ar'golis. They were consulted by those 
who wished to penetrate the future. To this supersti- 
tion the Greeks were greatly addicted, and they allowed 
the gravest business to wait for the omens of the di- 
viner. A people thus disposed demanded and secured 
unmolested access to the oracle. The city in whose 
custody it was must be inviolable, and the roads thereto 
unobstructed. The oracle was a national possession, and 
its keepers were national servants. 

THE GRECIAN FESTIVALS. 

The public games or festivals of the Greeks were 
probably of greater efficacy in promoting a spirit of 
union than any other outgrowth of the religious senti- 
ment of Greece. The Greeks exhibited a passionate 
fondness for festivals and games, which were occasion- 
ally celebrated in every state for the amusement of the 
people. These, however, were far less interesting than 



CAUSES OF GREEK UNITY. 145 

the four great public games, sacred to the gods, which 
were— the Pythian, at Delphos, sacred to Apollo; the 
Isth'mian, at Corinth, to Neptune; the Nemean, at Ne- 
mea, to Hercules ; and the Olympic, at Olympia in E'lis, 
to Jupiter. To these cities flocked the young and the 
aged, the private citizen and the statesman, the trader 
and the artist, to witness or engage in the spectacles. 
The games were open to all citizens who could prove 
their Hellenic origin ; and prizes were awarded for the 
best exhibitions of skill in poetry — and in running, 
wrestling, boxing, leaping, pitching the discus, or quoit, 
throwing the javelin, and chariot-racing. 

The most important of these games was the Olympic, 
though it involved many principles common to the oth- 
ers. Its origin is obscure; and, though it appears that 
during the Heroic Age some Grecian chiefs celebrated 
their victories in public games at Olympia, yet it was 
not until the time of Lycurgus, in 776 b.c, that the 
games at Olympia were brought under certain rules, and 
performed at certain periods. At that time they were 
revived, so to speak, and were celebrated at the close of 
every fourth year. From their quadrennial occurrence 
all Hellas computed its chronology, the interval that 
elapsed between one celebration and the next being 
called an Olympiad. During the month that the game's 
continued there was a complete suspension of all hos- 
tilities, to enable every Greek to attend them without 
hinderance or danger. 

One of the most popular and celebrated of all the 
matches held at these games was chariot-racing, with 
four horses. The following description of one of these 
races is taken from a tragedy of Sophocles— the Electro, 
—translated by Bulwer. Orestes, son of Agamemnon, 
had gained five victories on the first day of the trial ; 
and on the second, of which the account is here given,, 

7 



146 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

he starts with nine competitors — an Achaean, a Spartan, 
two Libyans, an iEtolian, a Magnesian, an J^ni-an, an 
Athenian, and a Boeotian — and meets his death in the 
moment of triumph. 

The Chariot-race, and the Death of Orestes. 

They took their stand where the appointed judges 
Had cast their lots and ranged the rival ears. 
Rang out the brazen trump ! Away they bound ! 
Cheer the hot steeds and shake the slackened reins; 
As with a body the large space is filled 
With the huge clangor of the rattling cars; 
High whirl aloft the dust-clouds; blent together 
Each presses each, and the lash rings, and lond 
Snort the wild steeds, and from their fiery breath, 
Along their rnanes, and down the circling wheels, 
Scatter the flaking foam. 

Orestes still, 
Aye, as he swept around the perilous pillar 
Last in the course, wheeled in the rushing axle, 
The left rein curbed — that on the outer hand 
Flung loose. So on erect the chariots rolled! 
Sudden the JEnian's fierce and headlong steeds 
Broke from the bit, and, as the seventh time now 
The course was circled, on the Libyan car 
Dashed their wild fronts : then order changed to ruin ; 
Car dashed-on car; the wide Crissas'an plain 
Was, sea-like, strewn with wrecks : the Athenian saw, 
Slackened his speed, and, wheeling round the marge, 
Unscathed and skilful, in the midmost space, 
Left the wild tumult of that tossing storm. 

Behind, Orestes, hitherto the last, 

Had kept back his coursers for the close ; 

Now one sole rival left — on, on he flew, 

And the sharp sound of the impelling scourge 



, CAUSES OF GREEK UNITY. 147 

Rang in the keen ears of the flying steeds. 
He nears — he reaches — they are side by side ; 
Now one — now th' other — by a length the victor. 
The courses all are past, the wheels erect — 
All safe — when, as the hurrying coursers round 
The fatal pillar dashed, the wretched boy 
Slackened the left rein. On the column's edge 
Crashed the frail axle — headlong from the car. 
Caught and all mesh'd within the reins, he fell ; 
And, masterlcss, the mad steeds raged along ! 

Loud from that mighty multitude arose 

A shriek — a shout ! But yesterday such deeds — 

To-day such doom ! Now whirled upon the earth, 

Now his limbs dashed aloft, they dragged him, those 

Wild horses, till, all gory, from the wheels 

Released — and no man, not his nearest friends, 

Could in that mangled corpse have traced Orestes. 

They laid the body on the funerafpyre, 

And, while we speak, the Phocian strangers bear, 

In a small, brazen, melancholy urn, 

That handful of cold ashes to which all 

The grandeur of the beautiful hath shrunk. 

Within they bore him — in his father's land 

To find that heritage, a tomb. 

The Pythian games are said to have been established 
in honor of the victory that Apollo gained at Delphi 
over the serpent Py'thon, on setting out to erect his 
temple. This monster, said to have sprung from the 
stagnant waters of the deluge of Deucalion, may have 
been none other than the malaria which laid waste the 
surrounding country, and which some early benefactor 
of the race overcame by draining the marshes; or, per- 
haps, as the English writer, Dodwell, suggests, the true 
explanation of the allegorical fiction is that the serpent 



148 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

was the river Cephis'sus, which, after the deluge had 
overflowed the plains, surrounded Parnassus with its 
serpentine involutions, and was at length reduced, by 
the rays of the sun-god, within its due limits. The poet 
Ovid gives the following relation of the fable : 

Apollo's Conflict with Python. 

From hence the surface of the ground, with mud 
And slime besmeared (the refuse of the flood), 
Received the rays of heaven, and sucking in 
The seeds of heat, new creatures did begin. 
Some were of several sorts produced before ; 
But, of new monsters, earth created more. 
Unwillingly, but yet she brought to light 
Thee, Python, too, the wondering world to fright, 
And the new nations, with so dire a sight, 
So monstrous was his bulk; so large a space 
Did his vast body and long train embrace ; 
Whom Phoebus, basking on a bank, espied. 
Ere now the god his arrows had not tried 
But on the trembling deer or mountain-goat : 
At this new quarry he prepares to shoot. 

Though every shaft took place, he spent the store 
Of his full quiver; and 'twas long before 
The expiring serpent wallowed in liis gore. 
Then, to preserve the fame of such a deed, 
For Python slain he Pythian games decreed, 
Where noble youths for mastership should strive- 
To quoit, to run, and steeds and chariots drive. 
The prize was fame ; in witness of renown, 
An oaken garland did the victor crown. 
The laurel was not yet for triumphs born, 
But every green, alike by Phoebus worn, 
Did, with promiscuous grace, his flowing locks adorn. 

Metamorphoses. Trans, by Duyden. 



CAUSES OF GREEK UNITY. 149 

The victory of Apollo over the Python is repre- 
sented by a statue called Apollo Belvedere, perhaps the 
greatest existing work of ancient art. It was found in 
1503, among the ruins of ancient Antium, and it de- 
rives its name from its position in the belvedere, or open 
gallery, of the Vatican at Rome, where it was placed by 
Pope Julius II. It shows the conception which the an- 
cients had of this benign deity, and also the high degree 
of perfection to which they had attained in sculpture. 
A modern writer gives the following account of it: 

" The statue is of heroic size, and shows the very 
perfection of manly beauty. The god stands with the 
left arm extended, still holding the bow, while the right 
hand, which has just left the string, is near his hip. 
This right hand and part of the right arm, as well as 
the left hand, were wanting in the statue when found, 
and were restored by Angelo da Montor'soli, a pupil 
of Michael Angelo. The figure is nude ; only a short 
cloak hangs over the left shoulder. The breast is full 
and dilated ; the muscles are conspicuous, though not 
exaggerated; the body seems a little thin about the 
hips, but is poised with such singular grace as to impart 
to the whole a beauty hardly possessed by any other 
statue. The sculptor is not known : many attribute the 
statue to He-ge'si-as, the Ephesian, others to Praxit'e-les 
or Cal'amis ; but its origin and date must remain a 
matter of conjecture." 

The following poetical description of this wonderful 
statue is given us by Thomson : 

AH conquest-flushed, from prostrate Python came 
The quivered god. In graceful act he stands, 
His arm extended with the slackened bow : 
Light flows his easy robe, and fair displays 
A manly, softened form. The bloom of gods 
Seems youthful o'er the bearded cheek to wave ; 



150 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

His features yet heroic ardor warms ; 
And, sweet subsiding to a native smile, 
Mixed with the joy elating conquest gives, 
A scattered frown exalts his matchless air. 

■ 

THE NATIONAL COUNCILS. 

While the elements of union we have been consider- 
ing produced a decided effect in forming Greek national 
character — serving to strengthen, in the mind of the 
Greek, the feelings which bound him to his country by 
keeping alive his national love and pride, and exerting 
an important influence over his physical education and 
discipline— they possessed little or no efficacy as a bond 
of political union— what Greece so much needed. It 
was probably a recognition of this need that led, at an 
early period, to the formation of national councils, the 
primary object of which was the regulation of mutual 
intercourse between the several states. 

Of these early councils we have an example in the 
several associations known as the Amphicty'o-nes, of 
which the only one that approached a national senate 
received the distinctive title of the " Amphictyon'ic 
Council." This is said to have been instituted by Am- 
phic'tyon, a son of Deucalion, King of Thessaly; but 
he was probably a fictitious personage, invented to ac^ 
count for the origin of the institution attributed to him. 
The council is said to have been composed, originally, of 
deputies from twelve tribes or nations — two from each 
tribe. But, as independent states or cities grew up, each 
of these also was entitled to the same representation ; 
and no state, however powerful, was entitled to more. 
The council met twice every year; in the spring at 
Delphi, and in the autumn at Anthe'la, a village near 

Thermopylse. 

While the objects of this council, so far as they can 



CAUSES OF GREEK UNITY. 151 

be learned, were praiseworthy, and its action tended to 
produce the happiest political effects, it was, after all, 
more especially a religious association. It had no right 
of interference in ordinary wars between the communi- 
ties represented in it, and could not turn aside schemes 
of ambition and conquest, or subdue the jealousies of 
rival states. The oath taken by its members ran thus : 
"AVe will not destroy any Amphictyonic town, nor cut 
it off from running water in war or peace; if any one 
shall do so, we will march against him and destroy his 
city. If any one shall plunder the property of the god, 
or shall take treacherous counsel against the things in 
his temple at Delphi, we will punish him with foot, and 
hand, and voice, and by every means in our power." 
Its chief functions, as we see, were to guard the temple 
of Delphi and the interests of religion ; and it was only 
in cases of a violation of these, or under that pretence, 
that it could call for the co-operation of all its members. 
Inefficient as it had proved to be in many instances, yet 
Philip of Macedon, by placing himself at its head, over- 
turned the independence of Greece; but its use ceased 
altogether when the Delphic oracle lost its influence, a 
considerable time before the reign of Constantine the 
Great. 

Aside from the causes already assigned, the want of 
political union among the Greeks may be ascribed to a 
natural and mutual jealousy, which, in the language of 
Mr. Thirl wall, "stifled even the thought of a confedera- 
cy " that might have prevented internal wars and saved 
Greece from foreign dominion. This jealousy the in- 
stitutions to which we have referred could not remove ; 
and it was heightened by the great diversity of the 
forms of government that existed in the Grecian states. 
As another writer has well observed, "The independent 
sovereignty of each city was a fundamental notion in 



152 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the Greek mind. The patriotism of a Greek was con- 
fined to his city, and rarely kindled into any general 
love for the welfare of Hellas. So complete was the 
political division between the Greek cities, that the citi- 
zen of one was an alien and a stranger in the territory 
of another. He was not merely debarred from all share 
in the government, but he could not acquire property 
in land or houses, nor contract a marriage with a native 
woman, nor sue in the courts except through the medi- 
um of a friendly citizen. The cities thus repelling each 
other, the sympathies and feelings of a Greek became 
more central in his own." 

In view of these conditions it is not surprising that 
Greece never enjoyed political unity ; and just here was 
her e-reat and suicidal weakness. The Komans reduced 
various races, in habitual war with one another and 
marked by variations of dialect and customs, into a sin- 
gle government, and kept them there ; but the Greeks, 
though possessing a common inheritance, a common lan- 
guage, a common religion, and a common type of char- 
acter, of manners, and of aspirations, allowed all these 
common interests, that might have created an indissolu- 
ble political union, to be subordinated to mutual jeal- 
ousies — to an "exclusive patriotism" that rendered it 
difficult for them to unite even under circumstances 
of common and terrible danger. "It was this politi- 
cal disunion that always led them to turn their arms 
against one another, and eventually subjected them to 
the power of Macedon and of Kome." 



SPARTA, AND THE LEGISLATION OF LYCURGUS. 153 



CHAPTEE IV. 

SPARTA, AND THE LEGISLATION OF LYCURGUS. 

Spread on Eurotas' bank, 
Amid a circle of soft rising bills, 
Tbe patient Sparta stood ; tbe sober, hard, 
And man-subduing city ; which no shape 
Of pain could conquer, nor of pleasure charm. 
Lycurgus there built, on the solid base 
Of equal life, so well a tempered state, 
That firm for ages, and unmoved, it stood 
The fort of Greece ! Thomson. 

Returning to the Dorians of Peloponnesus, we find, 
in early historical times, that Sparta was gradually ac- 
quiring an ascendency over the other Dorian states, and 
extending her dominions throughout the southern por- 
tion of the peninsula. This result was greatly aided by 
her geographical position. On a table-land environed 
by hills, and with arduous descents to the sea, her nat- 
ural state was one of great strength, while her sterile 
soil promoted frugality, hardihood, and simplicity among 
her citizens. 

Some time in the ninth century Polydec'tes, one of 
the Spartan kings, died without children, and the reins 
of government fell into the hands of his brother Lycur- 
gus, who became celebrated as the " Spartan law-giver." 
But Lycurgus soon resigned the crown to the posthu- 
mous soii of Polydectes, and went into voluntary ex- 
ile. He is said to have visited many foreign lands, 
observing their institutions and manners, conversing 
with their sages, and employing his time in maturing 

a plan for remedying the many disorders which afflicted 

7* 



154 ■ MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

his native country. On his return he applied himself 
to the work of framing a new Constitution, having first 
consulted the Delphic oracle, which assured him that 
"the Constitution he should establish would be the most 
excellent in the world." 

I. THE CONSTITUTION OF LTCDRGUS. 

Having enlisted the aid of most of the prominent 
citizens, who took up arms to support him, Lycurgus 
procured the enactment of a code of laws founded on 
the institutions of the Cretan Minos, by which the form 
of government, the military discipline of the people, the 
distribution of property, the education of the citizens, 
and the rules of domestic life were to be established on 
a new and immutable basis. The account which Plu- 
tarch gives of these regulations asserts that Lycurgus 
first established a senate of thirty members, chosen for 
life, the two kings being of the number, and that the 
former shared the power of the latter. There were also 
to be assemblies of the people, who 'were to have no 
right to propose any subject of debate, but were only 
authorized to ratify or reject what might be proposed 
to them by the senate and the kings. Lycurgus next 
made a division of the lands, for here he found great 
inequality existing, as there were many indigent per- 
sons who had no lands, and the wealth was centred in 

the hands of a few. 

In order farther to remove inequalities among the 
citizens, Lycurgus next attempted to divide the movable 
property; but as this measure met with great opposi- 
tion, he had recourse to another method for accomplish- 
ing the same object. He stopped the currency of gold 
and silver coin, and permitted iron money only to be 
used ; and to a great quantity and weight of this he 



SPARTA, AND THE LEGISLATION OF LYCURGUS. 155 

assigned but a small value, so that to remove one or 
two hundred dollars of this money would require a yoke 
of oxen. This regulation is said to have put an end 
to many kinds of injustice ; for " who," says Plutarch, 
"would steal or take a bribe; who would defraud or 
rob when he could not conceal the booty — when he 
could neither be dignified by the possession of it nor 
be served by its use?" Unprofitable and superfluous 
arts were also excluded, trade with foreign states was 
abandoned, and luxury, losing its sources of support, 
died away of itself. 

Through the efforts of Lycurgus, Sparta was delivered 
from the evils of anarchy and misrule, and began a long 
period of tranquillity and order. Its progress was main- 
ly due, however, to that part of the legislation of Lycur- 
gus which related to the military discipline and educa- 
tion of its citizens. The position of Sparta, an unforti- 
fied city surrounded by numerous enemies, compelled 
the Spartans to be a nation of soldiers. From his birth 
every Spartan belonged to the state; sickly and de- 
formed children were destroyed, those only being 
thought worthy to live who promised to become useful 
members of society. The principal object of Spartan 
education, therefore, was to render the Spartan youth 
expert in manly exercises, hardy, and courageous; and 
at seven years of age he began a course of physical 
training of great hardship and even torture. Manhood 
was not reached until the thirtieth year, and thence- 
forth, until his sixtieth year, the Spartan remained un- 
der public discipline and in the service of the state. 
The women, also, were subjected to a course of training 
almost as rigorous as that of the men, and they took as 
great an interest in the welfare of their country and in 
the success of its arms. "Keturn, either with your 
shield or upon it," was their exhortation to their sons 



156 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

when the latter were going to battle. The following 
lines, supposed to be addressed by a Spartan mother to 
the dead body of her son, whom she had slain because 
he had ingloriously fled from the battle-field, will illus- 
trate the Spartan idea of patriotic virtue which was so 
sedulously instilled into every Spartan : 

Deme'trius, when he basely fled the field, 
A Spartan born, his Spartan mother killed ; 
Then, stretching forth his bloody sword, she cried 
(Her teeth fierce gnashing with disdainful pride), 
" Fly, cursed offspring, to the shades below, 
Where proud Euro'tas shall no longer flow 
For timid hinds like thee ! Fly, trembling slave, 
Abandoned wretch, to Pluto's darkest cave ! 
For I so vile a monster never bore : 

Disowned by Sparta, thou'rt my son no more." 

Tymn^e'us. 

There were three classes among the population of 
Laconia— the Dorians, of Sparta ; their serfs, the He'- 
lots; and the people of the provincial districts. The 
former, properly called Spartans, were the ruling caste, 
who neither employed themselves in agriculture nor 
practised any mechanical art. The Helots were slaves, 
who, as is generally believed, on account of their ob- 
stinate resistance in some early wars, and subsequent 
conquest, had been reduced to the most degrading ser- 
vitude. The people of the provincial districts were a 
mixed race, composed partly of strangers who had ac- 
companied the Dorians and aided them in their con- 
quest, and partly of the old inhabitants of the country 
who had submitted to the conquerors. The provincials 
were under the control of the Spartan government, in 
the administration of which they had no share, and the 
lands which they held were tributary to the state ; they 



SPARTA, AND THE LEGISLATION OF LYCURGUS. 157 

formed an important part of the military force of the 
country, and had little to complain of but the want of 
political independence. 



II. SPARTAN POETRY AND MUSIC. 

With all her devotion to the pursuit of arms, the 
bard, the sculptor, and the architect found profitable 
employment in Sparta. While the Spartans never ex- 
hibited many of those qualities of mind and heart whfch 
were cultivated at Athens with such wonderful success, 
they were not strangers to the influences of poetry and 
music. Says the poet Campbell, " The Spartans used 
not the trumpet in their march into battle, because they 
wished not to excite the rage of their warriors. Their 
charging step was made to the ' Dorian mood of flute 
and soft recorder.' The valor of a Spartan was too 
highly tempered to require a stunning or rousing im- 
pulse. His spirit was like a steed too proud for the 
spur." 

They marched not with the trumpet's blast, 
Nor bade the horn peal out, 

And the laurel-groves, as on they passed, 
Rung with no battle-shout ! 

They asked no clarion's voice to fire 

Their souls with an impulse high ; 
But the Dorian reed and the Spartan lyre 

For the sons of liberty ! 

And still sweet flutes, their path around, 

Sent forth Eolian breath ; 
They needed not a sterner sound 

To marshal them for death ! Mrs. Hemans. 

" The songs of the Spartans," says Plutarch, " had a 
spirit which could rouse the soul, and impel it in an en- 



158 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

thusiastic manner to action. They consisted chiefly of 
the praises of heroes that had died for Sparta, or else of 
expressions of detestation for such wretches as had de- 
clined the glorious opportunity. Nor did they forget 
to express an ambition for glory suitable to their respec- 
tive ages. Of this it may not be amiss to give an in- 
stance. There were three choirs in their festivals, corre- 
sponding with the three ages of man. The old men 

began, 

1 Once in battle bold we shone ;' 

the ycung men answered, 

' Try ns ; our vigor is not gone ;' 
and the boys concluded, 

'The palm remains for us alone.' 

Indeed, if we consider with some attention such of the 
Lacedaemonian poems as are still extant, and enter into 
the spirit of those airs which were played upon the flute 
when marching to battle, we must agree that Terpan'der 
and Pindar have very fitly joined valor and music to- 
gether. The former thus speaks of Lacedsemon : 

Then gleams the youth's bright falchion ; then the Muse 
Lifts her sweet voice ; then awful Justice opes 
Her wide pavilion. 

And Pindar sings, 

Then in grave council sits the sage : 
Then burns the youth's resistless rage 

To hurl the quiv'ring lance ; 
The Muse with glory crowns their arms, 
And Melody exerts her charms, 

And Pleasure leads the dance. 

Thus we are informed not only of their warlike turn, 
but of their skill in music." 



SPARTA, AND THE LEGISLATION OF LYCUKGUS. 159 

The poet Ion, of Chios, gives us the following elegant 
description of the power of Sparta : 

The town of Sparta is not walled with words ; 
But when young A'res falls upon her men, 
Then reason rules, and the hand does the deed. 



III. SPARTA'S CONQUESTS. 

Under the constitution of Lycurgus Sparta began her 
career of conquest. Of the death of the great law-giver 
'we have no reliable account; but it is stated that, hav- 
ing bound the Spartans to make no change in the laws 
until his return, he voluntarily banished himself forever 
from his country and died in a foreign land. During a 
century or more subsequent to frhe time of Lycurgus, 
the Spartans remained at peace with their neighbors; 
but jealousies arose between them and the Messe'nians, 
a people west of Laconia, which, stimulated by insults 
and injuries on both sides, gave rise to the First Messe- 
nian War, 743 years before the Christian era. For the 
first- four years the Spartans made little progress; but 
in the fifth year of the war a great battle was fought, 
and, although its result was indecisive, the Messenians 
deemed it prudent to retire to the strongly fortified 
mountain of Itho'me. In the eighteenth year of the 
conflict the Spartans suffered a severe defeat, and were 
driven back into their own territory; but at the close of 
the twentieth year the Messenians were obliged to aban- 
don their fortress of Ithome, and leave their rich fields 
in the undisturbed possession of their conquerors. Many 
of the inhabitants fled into Arcadia and other friendly 
territories, while those who remained were treated with 
great severity, and reduced to the condition of the 
Helots, 



160 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The war thus closed developed the warlike spirit that 
the institutions of Lycnrgus were so well calculated to 
encourage; and the Spartans were so stern and unyield- 
ing in their exactions, that they drove the Messenians to 
revolt thirty-nine years later, 685 b.c. The Messenians 
found an able leader in Aristom'enes, whose valor in the 
first battle struck fear into his enemies, and inspired his 
countrymen with confidence. In this struggle the Ar- 
rives, Arcadians, Si-cy-o'nians, and Pisa'tans aided Mes- 
senia, while the Corinthians assisted Sparta. In alarm 
the Spartans sought the advice of the Delphic oracle, 
and received the mortifying response that they must ■ 
seek a leader from the Athenians, between whose coun- 
try and Laconia there had been no intercourse for sev- 
eral centuries. Fearing to disobey the oracle, but reluc- 
tant to further the cause of the Spartans, the Athenians 
sent to the latter the poet Tykt^us, who had no distinc- 
tion as a warrior. His patriotic and martial odes, how- 
ever, roused the spirit of the Spartans, and animated 
them to new efforts against the foe. He appears as the 
geeat hero of Sparta during the Second Messenian 
War, and of his songs that have come down to us we 
give the following as a specimen : 

To the field, to the field, gallant Spartan band, 
Worthy sons, like your sires, of our warlike land ! 
Let each arm be prepared for its part in the fight, 
Fix the shield on the left, poise the spear with the right ; 
Let no care for your lives in your bosoms find place, 
No such care knew the heroes of old Spartan race. 1 

But the Spartans were not immediately successful. In 
the first battle that ensued they were defeated with se- 
vere loss; but in the third year of the war the Messe- 



i Mure's "History of Greek Literature," vol. Hi., p. 195. 



SPARTA, AND THE LEGISLATION OF LYCURGUS. 161 

nians suffered a signal defeat, owing to the treachery 
of Aristoc'rates, the king of their Arcadian allies, who 
deserted them in the heat of battle, and Aristomenes 
retired to the mountain fortress of Ira. The war con- 
tinued, with varying success, seventeen years in all; 
throughout the whole of which period Aristomenes dis- 
tinguished himself by many noble exploits; but all his 
efforts to save his country were ineffectual. A second 
time Sparta conquered (668 B.C.), and the yoke appeared 
to be h'xed on Messenia forever. Thenceforward the 
growing power of Sparta seemed destined to undisputed 
pre-eminence, not only in the Peloponnesus, but through- 
out all Greece. Before 600 b.c. Sparta had conquered 
the upper valley of the Eurotas from the Arcadians, 
and, forty years later, compelled Te'gea, the capital of 
Arcadia, to acknowledge her supremacy. Still later, in 
524 b.c, a long struggle with the Argives was terini, 
nated in favor of Sparta, and she was now the most 
powerful of the Grecian states. 



162 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTER V. 

FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, AND CHANGES IN GRECIAN 

POLITICS. 

Although Greek political writers taught that there 
were, primarily, but three forms of government— mon- 
archy, or the rule of one ; aristocracy, that of the few ; 
and democracy, that of the many— the latter always lim- 
ited by the Greeks to the freemen—yet it appears that 
when any one of these degenerated from its supposed 
legitimate object, the welfare of the state, it was marked 
by a peculiar name. Thus a monarchy in which selfish 
aims predominated became a tyranny ; and in later Gre- 
cian history, such was the prevailing sentiment in oppo- 
sition to kingly rule that all kings were called tyrants : 
an aristocracy which directed its measures chiefly to the 
preservation of its power became an oligarchy ; and a 
democracy that departed from the civil and political 
equality which was its supposed basis, and gave ascen- 
dency to a faction, was sometimes designated by the 
term ochlocracy, or the dominion of the rabble.^ 'A 
democracylhus corrupted," says Thirlwall, "exhibited 
many features of a tyranny. It was jealous of all who 
were eminently distinguished by birth, fortune, or repu- 
tation ; it encouraged flatterers and sycophants ; was in- 
satiable in its demands on the property of the rich, and 
readily listened to charges which exposed them to death 
or confiscation. The class which suffered such oppres- 
sion, commonly ill satisfied witli the principle of the 
Constitution itself, was inflamed with the most furious 



FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, AND GRECIAN POLITICS. 163 

animosity by the mode in which it was applied, and it 
regarded the great mass of its fellow-citizens as its mor- 
tal enemies." 

As in all the Greek states there was a large class of 
people not entitled to the full rights of citizenship, in- 
cluding, among others, persons reduced to slavery as 
prisoners of war, and foreign settlers and their descend- 
ants, so there was no such form of government as that 
which the moderns understand by a complete democ- 
racy. Of a republic also, in the modern acceptation of the 
term — that is, a representative democracy — the Greeks 
knew nothing. As an American statesman remarks, 
" Certain it is that the greatest philosophers among them 
would have regarded as something monstrous a repub- 
lic spreading over half a continent and embracing twen- 
ty-six states, each of which would have itself been an 
empire, and not a commonwealth, in their sense of the 
word." J 



I. CHANGES FROM ARISTOCRACIES TO OLIGARCHIES. 

During several centuries succeeding the period of the 
& Hpps sod Trojan war, a gradual change occurred in the 
political history of the Grecian states, the results of 
which were an abandonment of much of the kingly au- 
thority that prevailed through the Heroic Age. At a 
still later period this change was followed by the intro- 
duction and establishment, at first, of aristocracies, and, 
finally, of democratic forms of government ; which lat- 
ter decided the whole future character of the public 
life of the Grecians. The three causes, more promi- 
nent than the rest, that are assigned by most writers 
for these changes, and the final adoption of democratic 



1 Hugh S. Legare's Writings, vol. i., p. 440. 



164 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

forms, are, first, the more enlarged views occasioned by 
the Trojan war, and the dissensions which followed the 
return of those engaged in it; second, the great convul- 
sions that attended the Thessalian, Boeotian, and Dorian 
migrations; and, third, the free principles which inter- 
course and trade with the Grecian colonies naturally 
engendered. 

But of these causes the third tended, more than any 
other one, to change the political condition of the Gre- 
cians. Whether the migrations of the Greek colonists 
were occasioned, as they generally were, by conquests 
that drove so many from their homes to seek an asylum 
in foreign lands, or were undertaken, as was the case in 
some instances, with the consent and encouragement of 
the parent states, there was seldom any feeling of de- 
pendence on the one side, and little or no claim of au- 
thority on the other. This was especially the case with 
the Ionians, who had scarcely established themselves in 
Asia Minor when they shook off the authority of the 
princes who conducted them to their new settlements, 
and established a form of government more democratic 
than any which then existed in Greece. 

With the rapid progress of mercantile industry and 
maritime discovery, on which the prosperity of the colo- 
nies depended, a spirit of independence grew up, which 
erelong exerted an influence on the parent states of 
Greece, and encouraged the growth of free principles 
there. " Freedom," says an eloquent author, 1 "ripens 
in colonies. Ancient usage cannot be preserved, cannot 
altogether be renewed, as at home. The former bonds 
of attachment to the soil, and ancient customs, are bro- 
ken by the voyage; the spirit feels itself to be more 
free in the new country ; new strength is required for 



» Heeren, "Politics of Ancient Greece," p. 103. 



FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, AND GRECIAN POLITICS. 165 

the necessary exertions; and those exertions are ani- 
mated by success. When every man lives by the labor 
of his hands, equality arises, even if it did not exist 
before. Each day is fraught with new experience ; the 
necessity of common defence is more felt in lands where 
the new settlers find ancient inhabitants desirous of 
being free from them. Need we wonder, then, if the 
authority of the founders of the Grecian colonies, even 
where it had originally existed, soon gave way to 
liberty?" 

But the changes in the political principles of the Gre- 
cian states were necessarily slow, and were usually at- 
tended with domestic quarrels and convulsions. Mon- 
archy, in most instances, was abolished by first taking 
away its title, and substituting that of archon, or chief 
magistrate, a term less offensive than that of king ; next, 
by making the office of chief ruler elective, first in one 
family, then in more— first for life, then for a term of 
years ; and, finally, by dividing the power among several 
of the nobility, thus forming an aristocracy or oligarchy. 
At the time in Grecian history to which we have come 
democracy was as yet unknown ; but the principal Gre- 
cian states, with the exception of Sparta, which always 
retained the kingly form of government, had abolished 
royalty and substituted oligarchy. This change did not 
better the condition of the people, who, increasing in 
numbers and intelligence, while the ruling class declined 
in numbers and wealth, became conscious of their re- 
sources, and put forward their claims to a representa- 
tion in the government. 



II. FROM OLIGARCHIES TO DESPOTISMS. 

The fall of the oligarchies was not accomplished, how • 
ever, by the people. "The commonalty," says Tiiirl- 



166 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

wall, "even when really superior in strength, could 
not all at once shake off the awe with which it was im- 
pressed by years of subjection. It needed a leader to 
animate, unite, and direct it ; and it was seldom that one 
capable of inspiring it with confidence could be found 
in its own ranks." Hence this leader was generally 
found in an ambitious citizen, perhaps a noble or a 
member of the oligarchy, who, by artifice and violence, 
would make himself the supreme ruler of the state. 
Under such circumstances the overthrow of an oli- 
garchy was not a triumph of the people, but only the 
triumph of a then popular leader. To such a one was 
given the name of tyrant, but not in the sense that 
we use the term. Heeeen says, " The Grecians con- 
nected with this word the idea of an illegitimate, but 
not necessarily of a cruel, government." As the word 
therefore signifies simply the irresponsible rule of a 
single person, such person may be more correctly des- 
ignated by the term despot, or usurper; although, in 
point of fact, the government was frequently of the 
most cruel and tyrannical character. 

"The merits of this race of rulers," says Bulwer, 
"and the unconscious benefits they produced, have not 
been justly appreciated, either by ancient or modern 
historians/ Without her tyrants Greece might never 
have established her democracies. The wiser and more 
celebrated tyrants were characterized by an extreme 
modesty of deportment : they assumed no extraordinary 
pomp, no lofty titles— they left untouched, or rendered 
yet more popular, the outward forms and institutions of 
the government — they were not exacting in taxation — 
they affected to link themselves with the lowest orders, 
and their ascendency was usually productive of immedi- 
ate benefit to the working-classes, whom they employed 
in new fortifications or new public buildings— dazzling 



FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, AND GRECIAN POLITICS. 167 

the citizens by a splendor that seemed less the ostenta- 
tion of an individual than the prosperity of a state. It 
was against the aristocracy, not against the people, that 
they directed their acute sagacities and unsparing ener- 
gies. Every politic tyrant was a Louis the Eleventh, 
weakening the nobles, creating a middle class. He ef- 
fected his former object by violent and unscrupulous 
means. He swept away by death or banishment all 
who opposed his authority or excited his fears. He 
thus left nothing between the state and a democracy 
but himself; and, himself removed, democracy naturally 
and of course ensued." 1 

From the middle of the seventh century b.c, and dur- 
ing a period of over one hundred and fifty years, there 
were few Grecian cities that escaped a despotic govern- 
ment. While the history of Athens affords, perhaps, 
the most striking example of it, the longest tyranny in 
Greece was that in the city of Si'cyon, which lasted a 
hundred years under Orthag'orus and his sons. Their 
dynasty was founded about 676 b.c, and its long dura- 
tion is ascribed to its mildness and moderation. The last 
of this dynasty was Clis'thenes, whose daughter became 
the mother of the Athenian Clisthenes, the founder of 
democracy at Athens on the expulsion of the Pisistrat'- 
idae. The despots of Corinth were more celebrated. 
Their dynasty endured seventy-four years, having been 
founded in the year 655. Under Perian'der, who suc- 
ceeded to power in 625, and whose government was 
cruel and oppressive, Corinth reached her highest pros- 
perity. His reign lasted upward of forty years, and soon 
after his death the dynasty ended, being overpowered by 
Sparta. 

Across the isthmus from Corinth was the city of Me^'- 



1 "Athens : Its Rise and Fall," vol. i., pp. 148, 149. 



168 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ara, of which, in 630 b.c., Theag'enes, a bold and ambi- 
tious man, made himself despot. Like many other usurp- 
ers of his time, he adorned the city with splendid and 
useful buildings. But he was overthrown after a rule of 
thirty years, and a violent struggle then ensued between 
the oligarchy and the people. At first the latter were 
successful ; they banished many of the nobles, and con- 
fiscated their property, but the exiles returned, and by 
force of arms recovered their power. Still the struggle 
continued, and it was not until after many years that an 
oligarchical government was firmly established. Much 
interest is added to these revolutions in Megara by the 
writings of Theog'nis, a contemporary poet, and a mem- 
ber of the oligarchical party. "His writings," says 
Thiklwall, " are interesting, not so much for the his- 
torical facts contained in them as for the light they 
throw on the character and feelings of the parties which 
divided his native city and so many others." 

In the poems of Theognis " his keen sense of his per- 
sonal sufferings is almost absorbed in the vehement grief 
and indignation with which he contemplates the state of 
Megara, the triumph of the lad [his usual term for the 
people], and the degradation of the good [the members 
of the old aristocracy]." Some of the social changes 
which the popular revolution had effected are thus de- 
scribed : 

Our commonwealth preserves its former fame: 
Our common people are no more the same. 
They that in skins and hides were rudely dressed, 
Nor dreamed of law, nor sought to be redressed 
By rules of right, but in the days of old 
Lived on the land like cattle in the fold, 
Are now the Brave and Good ; and we, the rest, 
Are now the Mean and Bad, though once the best. 



FORMS OF GOVERNMENT, AND GRECIAN POLITICS. 169 

It appears, also, that some of the aristocracy by birth 
had so far forgotten their leading position as to inter- 
marry with those who had become possessed of much 
wealth ; and of this condition of things the poet com- 
plains as follows : 

But in the daily matches that we make 
The price is everything ; for money's sake 
Men marry — women are in marriage given ; 
The Bad or Coward, that in wealth has thriven, 
May match his offspring with the proudest race : 
Thus everything is mixed, noble and base. 

The usurpations in Sicyon, Corinth, and Megara fur- 
nish illustrations of what occurred in nearly all of the 
Grecian states during the seventh and sixth centuries 
before the Christian era. Some of those of a later pe- 
riod will be noticed in a subsequent chapter. 

8 



170 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTER VI. 

THE EAELY HISTORY OF ATHENS. 
I. THE LEGISLATION OF DRACO. 

As we have already stated, the successive encroach- 
ments on the royal prerogatives that followed the death 
of Co'drns, and that finally resulted in the establishment 
of an oligarchy, are almost the only events that fill the 
meagre annals of Athens for several centuries, 1 or down 
to 683 B.C. " Here, as elsewhere," says a distinguished 
historian, "a wonderful stillness suddenly follows the 
varied stir of enterprise and adventure, and the throng 
of interesting characters that present themselves to our 
view in the Heroic Age. Life seems no longer to offer 
anything for poetry to celebrate, or for history to re- 
cord." The history of Athens, therefore, may be said 
to begin with the institution of the nine annual archons 
in 683 b.c. These possessed all authority, religious, civil, 
and military. The Athenian populace not only enjoyed 
no political rights, but were reduced to a condition only 
a little above servitude; and it appears to have been 
owing to the anarchy that arose from the ruinous extor- 
tions of the nobles on the one hand, and the resistance 
of the people on the other, that Dra'co, the most eminent 
of the nobility, was chosen to prepare the first written 
code of laws for the government of the state (624 b.c). 
Draco prepared his code in conformity to the spirit 
and the interest of the ruling class, and the severity of 



i Sec page 74. 



THE EARLY HISTORY OF ATHENS. 171 

his laws has made his name proverbial. It has been said 
of them that they were written, not in ink, but in blood. 
He attached the same penalty to petty thefts as to sacri- 
lege and murder, saying that the former offences de- 
served death, and he had no greater punishment for the 
latter. Of course, the legislation of Draco failed to calm 
the prevailing discontent, and human nature soon re- 
volted against such legalized butchery. Says an English 
author, "The first symptoms in Athens of the political 
crisis which, as in other of the Grecian states, marked 
the transition of power from the oligarchic to the popu- 
lar party, now showed itself." Cy'lon, an Athenian of 
wealth and good family, had married the daughter of 
Theagenes, the despot of Megara. Encouraged by his 
father-in-law's success, he conceived the design of seiz- 
ing the Acropolis at the next Olympic festival and mak- 
ing himself master of Athens. Accordingly, at that time 
he seized the Acropolis with a considerable force ; but 
not having the support of the mass of the people the 
conspiracy failed, and most of those engaged in it were 
put to death. 



II. LEGISLATION OF SOLON. 

The Commonwealth was finally reduced to complete 
anarchy, without law, or order, or system in the admin- 
istration of justice, when Solon, who was descended from 
Codrus, was raised to the office of first magistrate (594 
b.c). Solon was born in Salamis, about 638 B.C., and 
his first appearance in public life at Athens occurred in 
this wise : A few years prior to the year 600 the Island 
of Salamis had revolted from Athens to Megara. The 
Athenians had repeatedly failed in their attempts to re- 
cover it, and, finally, the odium of defeat was such that 
a law was passed forbidding, upon pain of death, any 



172 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

proposition for the renewal of the enterprise. Indignant 
at this pusillanimous policy, Solon devised a plan for 
rousing his countrymen to action. Having some poet- 
ical talent, he composed a poem on the loss of Salamis, 
and, feigning madness in order to evade the penalty of 
the law, he rushed into the market-place. Plutaech 
says, " A great number of people flocking about him 
there, he got up on the herald's stone, and sang the 
elegy which begins thus : 

' Hear and attend ; from Salamis I came 
To show your error.' " 

The stratagem was successful : the law was repealed, an 
expedition against Salamis was intrusted to the com- 
mand of Solon, and in one campaign he drove the Meg- 
arians from the island. 

Solon the poet, orator, and soldier, became the judi- 
cious law-giver, whose fame reached the remotest parts 
of the then known world, and whose laws became the 
basis of those of the Twelve Tables of Kome. Says an 
English poet, 

Who knows not Solon, last, and wisest far, 

Of those whom Greece, triumphant in the height 

Of glory, styled her father ? him whose voice 

Through Athens hushed the storm of civil wrath ; 

Taught envious Want and cruel Wealth to join 

In friendship, and with sweet compulsion tamed 

Minerva's eager people to his laws, 

Which their own goddess in his breast inspired ? 

Akenside. 

Having been raised, as stated, to the office of first ar- 
chon, Solon was chosen, by the consent of all parties, as 
the arbiter of their differences, and invested with full 
authority to frame a new Constitution and a new code of 



THE EARLY HISTORY OF ATHENS. 173 

laws. He might easily have perverted this almost un- 
limited power to dangerous uses, and his friends urged 
him to make himself supreme ruler of Athens. But he 
told them, " Tyranny is a fair field, but it has no out- 
let;" and his stern integrity was proof against all temp- 
tations to swerve from the path of honor and betray the 
trust reposed in him. 

The ridicule to which he was exposed for rejecting a 
usurper's power he has described as follows : 

Nor wisdom's palm, nor deep-laid policy 

Can Solon boast. For when its noblest blessings 

Heaven poured into his lap, he spurned them from him. 

AVhere was his sense and spirit when enclosed 

He found the choicest prey, nor deigned to draw it ? 

Who, to command fair Athens but one day, 

Would not himself, with all his race, have fallen 

Contented on the morrow ? 

The grievous exactions of the ruling orders had al- 
ready reduced the laboring classes to poverty and abject 
dependence ; and all whom bad times or casual disasters 
had compelled to borrow had been impoverished by the 
high rates of interest ; while thousands of insolvent debt- 
ors had been sold into slavery, to satisfy the demands of 
relentless creditors. In this situation of affairs the most 
violent or needy demanded a new distribution of prop- 
erty ; while the rich would have held on to all the fruits 
of their extortion and tyranny. Pursuing a middle 
course between these extremes, Solon relieved the 
debtor by reducing the rate of interest and enhancing 
the value of the currency : he also relieved the lands of 
the poor from all encumbrances; he abolished imprison- 
ment for debt ; he restored to liberty those whom pov- 
erty had placed in bondage; and he repealed all the 
laws of Draco except those against murder. He next 



174 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

arranged all the citizens in four classes, according to 
their landed property ; the first class alone being eligible 
to the highest civil offices and the highest commands in 
the army, while only a few of the lower offices were 
open to the second and third classes. The latter classes, 
however, were partially relieved from taxation ; but in 
war they were required to do duty, the one as cavalry, 
and the other as heavy-armed infantry. 

Individuals of the fourth class were excluded from 
all offices, but in return they were wholly exempt from 
taxation ; and yet they had a share in the government, 
for they were permitted to take part in the popular 
assemblies, which had the right of confirming or reject- 
ing new laws, and of electing the magistrates ; and here 
their votes counted the same as those of the wealthiest 
of the nobles. In war they served only as light troops 
or manned the fleets. Thus the system of Solon, being 
based primarily on property qualifications, provided for 
all the freemen ; and its aim was to bestow upon the 
commonalty such a share in the government as would 
enable it to protect itself, and to give to the wealthy 
what was necessary for retaining their dignity — throw- 
ing the burdens of government on the latter, and not 
excluding the former from its benefits. 

Solon retained the magistracy of the nine archons, 
but with abridged powers ; and, as a guard against dem- 
ocratical extravagance on the one hand, and a check to 
undue assumptions of power on the other, he instituted 
a Senate of Four Hundred, and founded or remodelled 
the court of the Areopagus. The Senate consisted of 
members selected by lot from the first three classes; 
but none could be appointed to this honor until they 
had undergone a strict examination into their past lives, 
characters, and qualifications. The Senate was to be 
consulted by the archons in all important matters, and 



THE EARLY HISTORY OF ATHENS. 175 

was to prepare all new laws and regulations, which were 
to be submitted to the votes of the assembly of the peo- 
ple. The court of the Areopagus, which held its sit- 
tings on an eminence on the western side of the Athe- 
nian Acropolis, was composed of persons who had held 
the office of archon, and was the supreme tribunal in all 
capital cases. It exercised, also, a general superintend- 
ence over education, morals, and religion ; and it could 
suspend a resolution of the public assembly, which it 
deemed foolish or unjust, until it had undergone a re- 
consideration. It was this court that condemned the 
philosopher Socrates to death; and before this same 
venerable tribunal the apostle Paul, six hundred years 
later, made his memorable defence of Christianity. 

Such is a brief outline of the institutions of Solon, 
which exhibit a mingling of aristocracy and democracy 
well adapted to the character of the age and the circum- 
stances of the people. They evidently exercised much 
less control over the pursuits and domestic habits of 
individuals than the Spartan code, but at the same time 
they show a far greater regard for the public morals. 
The success of Solon is well summed up in the follow- 
ing brief tribute to his virtues and genius, by the poet 
Thomson : 

He built his commonweal 
On equity's wide base : by tender laws 
A lively people curbing, yet undamped ; 
Preserving still that quick, peculiar fire, 
Whence in the laurelled field of finer arts 
And of bold freedom they unequalled shone, 
The pride of smiling Greece, and of mankind. 

Solon is said to have declared that his laws were not 
the best which he could devise, but w T ere the best that 
the Athenians could receive. In the following lines 



176 MOSAICS OF GEECIAN HISTOEY. 

we have his own estimate of the services he rendered 
in behalf of his distracted state : 

" The force of snow and furious hail is sent 

From swelling clouds that load the firmament. 

Thence the loud thunders roar, and lightnings glare 

Along the darkness of the troubled air. 

Unmoved by storms, old Ocean peaceful sleeps 

Till the loud tempest swells the angry deeps. 

And thus the State, in full distraction toss'd, 

Oft by its noblest citizen is lost ; 

And oft a people once secure and free, 

Their own imprudence dooms to tyranny. 

My laws have armed the crowd with useful might, 

Have banished honors and unequal right, 

Have taught the proud in wealth, and high in place, 

To reverence justice and abhor disgrace ; 

And given to both a shield, their guardian tower, 

Against ambition's aims and lawless power." 



III. THE USURPATION OF PISIS'TRATUS. 

The legislation of Solon was not followed by the total 
extinction of party-spirit, and, while he was absent from 
Athens on a visit to Egypt and other Eastern countries, 
the three prominent factions in the state renewed their 
ancient feuds. Pisistratus, a wealthy kinsman of Solon, 
who had supported the measures of the latter by his 
eloquence and military talents, had the art to gain the 
favor of the mass of the people and constitute himself 
their leader. Akenside thus happily describes him as — 

The great Pisistratus ! that chief renowned, 
Whom Hermes and the Ida'lian queen had trained, 
Even from his birth, to every powerful art 
Of pleasing and persuading ; from whose lips 
Flowed eloquence which, like the vows of love, 
Could steal away suspicion from the hearts 



THE EARLY HISTORY OF ATHENS. 177 

Of all who listened. Thus, from day to day 

He won the general suffrage, and beheld 

Each rival overshadowed and depressed 

Beneath his ampler state ; yet oft complained 

As one less kindly treated, who had hoped 

To merit favor, but submits perforce 

To find another's services preferred, 

Nor yet relaxeth aught of faith or zeal. 

Then tales were scattered of his envious foes, 

Of snares that watched his fame, of daggers aimed 

Against his life. 

When his schemes were ripe for execution, Pisistra- 
tus one day drove into the public square of Athens, his 
mules and himself disfigured with recent wounds in- 
flicted by his own hands, but which he induced the mul- 
titude to believe had been received from a band of 
assassins, whom his enemies, the nobility, had hired to 
murder " the friend of the people." Of this scene the 
same poet says : 

At last, with trembling limbs, 
His hair diffused and wild, his garments loose, 
And stained with blood from self-inflicted wounds, 
He burst into the public place, as there, 
There only were his refuge ; and declared 
In broken words, with sighs of deep regret, 
The mortal danger he had scarce repelled. 

The ruse was successful. An assembly was at once con- 
voked by his partisans, and the indignant crowd imme- 
diately voted him a guard of fifty citizens to protect his 
person, although Solon, who had returned to Athens and 
was present, warned them of the pernicious consequences 
of such a measure. 

Pisistratus soon took advantage of the favor he had 
gained, and, arming a large body of his adherents, he 
threw off the mask and seized the Acropolis. Solon 

8* 



178 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

alone, firm and undaunted, publicly presented himself 

in the market-place, and called upon the people to resist 

the usurpation. 

Solon, with swift indignant strides 

The assembled people seeks ; proclaims aloud 

It was no time for counsel ; in their spears 

Lay all their prudence now : the tyrant yet 

Was not so firmly seated on his throne, 

But that one shock of their united force 

Would dash him from the summit of his pride 

Headlong and grovelling in the dust. 

But his appeal was in vain, and Pisistratus, without op- 
position, made himself master of Athens. The usurper 
made no change in the Constitution, and suffered the 
laws to take their course. He left Solon undisturbed ; 
and it is said that the aged patriot, rejecting all offers of 
favor, went into voluntary exile, and soon after died at 
Salamis. Twice was Pisistratus driven from Athens by 
a coalition of the opposing factions, but he regained the 
sovereignty and succeeded in holding it until his death 
(527 B.C.). Although he tightened the reins of govern- 
ment, he ruled with equity and mildness, and adorned 
Athens with many magnificent and useful works, among 
them the Lyceum, that subsequently became the famous 
resort of philosophers aud poets. He is also said to have 
been the first person in Greece who collected a library, 
which he threw open to the public; and to him posterity 
is indebted for the collection of Homer's poems. Thirl- 
wall says: " On the whole, though we cannot approve of 
the steps by which Pisistratus mounted to power, we must 
own that he made a princely use of it ; and may believe 
that, though under his dynasty Athens could never have 
risen to the greatness she afterward attained, she was in- 
debted to his rule for a season of repose, during which she 
gained much of that strength which she finally unfolded." 



THE EARLY HISTOEY OF ATHENS. 179 

THE TYRANNY AND THE DEATH OF HIP' PI AS. 

On the death of Pisistratus his sons Hippias, Hippar'- 
clius, and Thes'salus succeeded to his power, and for 
some years trod in his steps and carried out his plans, 
only taking care to fill the most important offices with 
their friends, and keeping a standing force of foreign 
mercenaries to secure themselves from hostile factions 
and popular outbreaks. After a joint reign of fourteen 
years, a conspiracy was formed to free Attica from their 
rule, at the head of which were two young Athenians, 
Harmo'dius and Aristogi'ton, whose personal resentment 
had been provoked by an atrocious insult to the family 
of the former. One of the brothers was killed, but the 
two young Athenians also lost their lives in the struggle. 
Plippias, the elder of the rulers, now became a cruel 
tyrant, and soon alienated the affections of the people, 
who obtained the aid of the Spartans, and the family of 
the Pisistratids was driven from Athens, never to regain 
its former ascendency (510 B.C.). Hippias fled to the 
court of Artapher'nes, governor of Lydia, then a part of 
the Persian dominion of Dari'us, where his intrigues 
largely contributed to the opening of a war between 
Persia and Greece. 

The names of Harmodius and Aristogiton have been 
immortalized by what some writers term " the ignorant 
or prejudiced gratitude of the Athenians." Dr. Anthon 
considers them cowardly conspirators, entitled to no he- 
roic honors. But, as he says, statues were erected to 
them at the public expense ; and when an orator wished 
to suggest the idea of the highest merit and of the no- 
blest services to the cause of liberty, he never failed to 
remind his hearers of Harmodius and Aristogiton. Their 
names never ceased to be repeated with affectionate ad- 
miration in the convivial songs of Athens, which as- 



180 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

signed them a place in the islands of the "blessed," by 
the side of Achilles and Tydi'des. From one of the most 
famous and popular of these songs, by Callis'trattjs, we 
give the following verses: 

Harmodius, hail ! Though 'reft of breath, 
Thou ne'er shalt feel the stroke of death ; 
The heroes' happy isles shall be 
The bright abode allotted thee. 

***** 

While freedom's name is understood 
You shall delight the wise and good ; 
You dared to set your country free, 
And gave her laws equality. 



IV. THE BIRTH OF DEMOCRACY. 

On the expulsion of Hippias, Clis'thenes, to whom 
Athens was mainly indebted for its liberation from the 
Pisistratids, aspired to the political leadership of the 
state. But he was opposed by Isag'oras, who was sup- 
ported by the nobility. In order to make his cause pop- 
ular, Clisthenes planned, and succeeded in executing, a 
change in the Constitution of Solon, which gave to the 
people a greater share in the government. He divided 
the people into ten tribes, instead of the old Ionic four 
tribes, and these in turn were subdivided into districts 
or townships called de'rnes. He increased the powers 
and duties of the Senate, giving to it five hundred mem- 
bers, with fifty from each tribe ; and he placed the ad- 
ministration of the military service in the hands of ten 
generals, one being taken from each tribe. The reforms 
of Clisthenes gave birth to the Athenian democracy. 
As Thirlwall observes, " They had the effect of trans- 
forming the commonalty into a new body, furnished 
with new organs, and breathing a new spirit, which was 



THE EARLY HISTORY OF ATHENS. 181 

no longer subject to the slightest control from any influ- 
ence, save that of wealth and personal qualities, in the 
old nobility. The whole frame of the state was reor- 
ganized to correspond with the new division of the 
country." 

On the application of Isagoras and his party, Sparta, 
jealous of the growing strength of Athens, made three 
unsuccessful attempts to overthrow the Athenian democ- 
racy, and reinstate Hippias in supreme command. She 
finally abandoned the project, as she could find no allies 
to assist in the enterprise. "Athens had now entered 
upon her glorious career. The institutions of Clisthenes 
had given her citizens a personal interest in the welfare 
and the grandeur of their country, and a spirit of the 
warmest patriotism rapidly sprung up among them. The 
Persian Avars, which followed almost immediately, ex- 
hibit a striking proof of the heroic sacrifices which they 
were prepared to make for the liberty and the indepen- 
dence of their state." 



182 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTEK VII. 

A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREEK COLONIES. 

An important part of the history of Greece is that 
which embraces the age of Grecian colonization, and the 
extension of the commerce of the Greeks to nearly all 
the coasts of the Mediterranean. Of the various cir- 
cumstances that led to the planting of the Greek colo- 
nies, and especially of the Ionic, iEolian, and Dorian 
colonies on the coast of Asia Minor and the islands of 
the iEgean Sea, we have already spoken. These latter 
were ever intimately connected with Greece proper, in 
whose general history theirs is embraced ; but the cities 

I of Italy, Sicily, and Cyrena'ica were too far removed 
from the drama that was enacted around the shores of 
the Mgean to be more than occasionally and tempora- 
rily affected by the changing fortunes of the parent 
states. A brief notice, therefore, of some of those dis- 
tant settlements, that eventually rivalled even Athens 
and Sparta in power and resources, cannot be uninter- 
esting, while it will serve to give more accurate views 
of the extent and importance of the field of Grecian 
history. 

At an early period the shores of Southern Italy and 
Sicily were peopled by Greeks ; and so numerous and 
powerful did the Grecian cities become that the whole 
were comprised by Strabo and others under the appella- 

| tion Magna Grwcia, or Great Greece. The earliest of 
these distant settlements appear to have been made at 
Cu'mse and Neap'olis, on the western coast of Italy, 



A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREEK COLONIES. 183 

about the middle of the eleventh century. Cuinse was 
built on a rocky hill washed by the sea ; and the same 
name is still applied to the ruins that lie scattered 
around its base. Some of the most splendid fictions 
of Virgil's ^Eneid relate to the Cumsean Sibyl, whose 
supposed cave, hewn out of the solid rock, actually ex- 
isted under the city : 

A spacious cave, within its farmost part, 

Was hewed and fashioned by laborious art, 

Through the hill's hollow sides ; before the place 

A hundred doors a hundred entries grace ; 

As many voices issue, and the sound 

Of Sibyl's words as many times rebound. 

Mneid, B. VI. 

Gkote says: "The myth of the Sibyl passed from 
the Cymge'ans in ^E'olis, along with the other circum- 
stances of the tale of iEne'as, to their brethren, the in- 
habitants of Cumse in Italy. In the hollow rock under 
the very walls of the town was situated the cavern of 
the Sibyl ; and in the immediate neighborhood stood 
the wild woods and dark lake of Avernus, consecrated 
to the subterranean gods, and offering an establishment 
of priests, with ceremonies evoking the dead, for pur- 
poses of prophecy or for solving doubts and mysteries. 
It was here that Grecian imagination localized the 
Cimme'rians and the fable of O-dys'seus." 1 

The extraordinary fertility of Sicily was a great at- 
traction to the Greek colonists. Naxos, on the eastern 
coast of the island, was founded about the year 735 b.c. ; 
and in the following year some Corinthians laid the 
foundations of Syracuse. Ge'la, on the western coast 
of the island, and Messa'na, now Mess'i'na, on the strait 



1 The voyage of Ulysses (Odysseus) to the infernal regions. Odyssey, 



184: MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

between Italy and Sicily, were founded soon after. 
Agrigen'tum, on the south-western coast, was founded 
about a century later, and became celebrated for the 
magnificence of its public buildings. Pindar called it 
" the fairest of mortal cities," and to The'ron, its ruler 
from 488 to 472, the poet thus refers in the second 
Olympic ode : 

Come, now, my soul ! now draw the string ; 

Bend at the mark the bow : 

To whom shall now the glorious arrow wing 

The praise of mild benignity ? 

To Agrigentum fly, 

Arrow of song, and there thy praise bestow ; 

For I shall swear an oath : a hundred years are flown, 

But the city ne'er has known 

A hand more liberal, a more loving heart, 

Than, Theron, thine ! for such thou art. 

Yet wrong hath risen to blast his praise ; 
Breath of injustice, breathed from men insane, 
Who seek in brawling strain 
The echo of his virtues mild to drown, 
And with their violent deeds eclipse the days 
Of his serene renown. 

Unnumbered are the sands of th' ocean shore ; 
And who shall number o'er 

Those joys in others' breasts which Theron's hand hath sown ? 

Tram, by Elton. 

In the mean time the Greek cities Syb'aris, Croto'na, 
and Taren'tum had been planted on the south-eastern 
coast of Italy, and had rapidly grown to power and 
opulence. The territorial dominions of Sybaris and 
Crotona extended across the peninsula from sea to sea. 
The former possessed twenty-five dependent towns, and 
ruled over four distinct tribes or nations. The territo- 



A BKIEF HISTOKY OF THE GREEK COLONIES. 185 

ries of Crotona were still more extensive. These two 
Grecian states were at the maximum of their power 
about the year 560 b.c. — the time of the accession 
of Pisistratus at Athens — but they quarrelled with 
each other, and the result of the contest was the ruin 
of Sybaris, in 510 b.c. Tarentum was settled by a 
colony of Spartans about the year 707 b.c, soon after 
the first Messenian war. No details of its history during 
the first two hundred and thirty years of its existence 
are known to us; but in the fourth century b.c. the 
Tar'entines stood foremost among the Italian Greeks, 
and they maintained their power down to the time of 
Roman supremacy. 

During the first two centuries after the founding of 
Naxos, in Sicily, Grecian settlements were extended 
over the eastern, southern, and western sides of the 
island, while Him/era was the only Grecian town on 
the northern coast. These two hundred years were a 
period of prosperity among the Sicilian Greeks, who 
dwelt chiefly in fortified towns, and exercised authority 
over the surrounding native population, which gradually 
became assimilated in manners, language, and religion 
to the higher civilization of the Greeks. " It cannot be 
doubted," says Geote, "that these first two centuries 
were periods of steady increase among the Sicilian 
Greeks, undisturbed by those distractions and calamities 
which supervened afterward, and which led indeed to 
the extraordinary aggrandizement of some of their com- 
munities, but also to the ruin of several others ; more- 
over, it seems that the Carthaginians in Sicily gave 
them no trouble until the time of Ge'lon. Their posi- 
tion will seem singularly advantageous, if we consider 
the extraordinary fertility of the soil in this fine island, 
especially near the sea ; its capacity for corn, wine, and 
oil, the species of cultivation to which the Greek hus- 



186 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

bandman bad been accustomed under less favorable cir- 
cumstances; its abundant fisheries on the coast, so im- 
portant in Grecian diet, and continuing undiminished 
even at the present day — together with sheep, cattle, 
hides, wool, and timber from the native population in 
the interior." x 

During the sixth century before the Christian era 
the Greek cities in Sicily and Southern Italy were 
among the most powerful and flourishing that bore the 
Hellenic name. Ge'la and Agrigentum, on the south 
side of Sicily, had then become the most prominent of 
the Sicilian governments ; and at the beginning of the 
fifth century we find Gelon, a despot of the former 
city, subjecting other towns to his authority. Finally 
obtaining possession of Syracuse, he made it the seat 
of his empire (485 B.C.), leaving Gela to be governed 
by his brother Hi'ero, the first Sicilian ruler of that 

name. 

Gelon strengthened the fortifications and greatly en- 
larged the limits of Syracuse, while to occupy the en- 
larged space he dismantled many of the surrounding 
towns and transported their inhabitants to his new 
capital, which now became not only the first city in 
I Sicily, but, according to Herodotus, superior to any 
other Hellenic power. When, in 480 B.C., a formidable 
Carthaginian force under Hamir-car invaded Sicily at 
the instigation of Xerxes, King of Persia, who had over- 
run Greece proper and captured Athens, Gelon, at the 
head of fifty-five thousand men, engaged the Cartha- 
ginians in battle at Himera, and defeated them with 
terrible slaughter, Hamilcar himself being numbered 
among the slain. The victory at Himera procured for 
Sicily immunity from foreign war, while the defeat of 



» " History of Greece," vol. iii., p. 367. 



A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE GREEK COLONIES. 187 

Xerxes at Salamis, on the very same day, dispelled the 
terrific cloud that overhung the Greeks in that quarter. 
Syracuse continued a flourishing city for several cen- 
turies later; but the subsequent events of interest in 
her history will be related in a later chapter. Another 
Greek colony of importance was that of Cyre'ne, on 
the northern coast of Africa, between the territories of 
Egypt and Carthage. It was founded about 630 B.C., 
and, having the advantages of a fertile soil and fine cli- 
mate, it rapidly grew in wealth and power. For eight 
generations it was governed by kings; but about 460 
b.c. royalty was abolished and a democratic government 
was established. Cyrene finally fell under the power 
of the Carthaginians, and thus remained until Carthage 
was destroyed by the Eomans. We have mentioned 
only the most important of the Grecian colonies, and 
even the history that we have of these, the best known, 
is unconnected and fragmentary. 



188 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTEK VIII. 

PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 
I. THE POEMS OF HESIOD. 

The rapid development of literature and the arts is 
one of the most pleasing and striking features of Gre- 
cian history. As one writer has well said, " There was 
an uninterrupted progress in the development of the 
Grecian mind from the earliest dawn of the history of 
the people to the downfall of their political indepen- 
dence ; and each succeeding age saw the production of 
some of those master-works of genius which have been 
the models and the admiration of all subsequent time." 
The first period of Grecian literature, ending about 776 
b.c, may be termed the period of epic poetry. Its chief 
monuments are the epics of Homer and of Hesiod. The 
former are essentially heroic, concerning the deeds of 
warriors and demi-gods ; while the latter present to us 
the different phases of domestic life, and are more of an 
ethical and religious character. Homer represents the 
poetry, or school of poetry, belonging chiefly to Ionia, 
in Asia Minor. Of his poems we have already given 
some account, and, passing over the minor intervening 
poets, called Cyclic, of whose works we have scarcely 
any knowledge, we will here give a brief sketch of the 
poems ascribed to Hesiod. 

Hesiod is the representative of a school of bards 
which first developed in Boeotia, and then spread over 
Phocis and Euboea. The works purporting to be his, 
that have come down to us, are three in number — the 
Works and Days, the Theogony, and the Shield of Her- 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 189 

cules. The latter, however, is now generally considered 
the production of some other poet. From Dr. Felton 
we have the following general characterization of these 
poems: "Aside from their intrinsic merit as poetical 
compositions, these poems are of high value for the 
light they throw on the mythological conceptions of 
those early times, and for the vivid pictures presented, 
by the Works and Daijs, of the hardships and pleasures 
of daily life, the superstitious observances, the homely 
wisdom of common experience, and the proverbial phi- 
losophy into which that experience had been wrought. 
For the truthfulness of the delineation generally all an- 
tiquity vouched; and there is in the style of expression 
and tone of thought a racy freshness redolent of the na- 
tive soil." Of the poet himself we learn, from his writ- 
ings, that he was a native of As'cra, a village at the foot 
of Mount Hel'icon, in Boeotia. Of the time of his birth 
we have no account, but it is probable that he flourished 
from half a century to a century later than Homer. 
But few incidents of his life are related, and these he 
gives us in his works, from which we learn that he was 
engaged in pastoral pursuits, and that he was deprived 
of the greater part of his inheritance by the decision 
of judges whom his brother Per'ses had bribed. This 
brother subsequently became much reduced in circum- 
stances, and applied to Hesiod for relief. The poet as- 
sisted him, and then addressed to him the Works and 
Days, in which he lays down certain rules for the regu- 
lation and conduct of his life. 

The design of Hesiod, as a prominent writer observes, 
was " to communicate to his brother in emphatic lan- 
guage, and in the order, or it might be the disorder, 
which his excited feelings suggested, his opinions or 
counsels on a variety of matters of deep interest to 
both, and to the social circle in which they moved. * * * 



190 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The Works and Bays may be more appropriately enti- 
tled ' A Letter of Kemonstrance or Advice' to a brother; 
of remonstrance on the folly of his past conduct, of 
advice as to the future. Upon these two fundamental 
data every fact, doctrine, and illustration of the poem 
depends, as essentially as the plot of the Iliad on the 
anger of Achilles." 1 The whole work has been well 
characterized by another writer as "the most ancient 
specimen of didactic poetry, consisting of ethical, politi- 
cal, and minute economical precepts. It is in a homely 
and unimaginative style, but is impressed throughout 
with a lofty and solemn feeling, founded on the idea 
that the gods have ordained justice among men, have 
made labor the only road to prosperity, and have so or- 
dered the year that every work has its appointed season, 
the sign of which may be discerned." 

There are three remarkable episodes in the Works 
and Days. The first is the tale of Prometheus, which 
is continued in the Theogony ; and the second is that of 
the Four Ages of Man. Both of these are types of cer- 
tain stages or vicissitudes of human destiny. The third 
episode is a description of Winter, a poem not so much 
in keeping with the spirit of the work, but " one in 
which there is much fine and vigorous painting." The 
following extract from it furnishes a specimen of the 
poet's descriptive powers : 

Winter. 

Beware the January month, beware 
Those hurtful days, that keenly-piercing air 
Which flays the herds ; when icicles are cast 
O'er frozen earth, and sheathe the nipping blast. 
From courser-breeding Thrace comes rushing forth 
O'er the broad sea the whirlwind of the north, 



Murc's " Language and Literature of Ancient Greece," vol. ii., p. 384. 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 191 

And moves it with his breath : the ocean floods 

Heave, and earth bellows through her wild of woods. 

Full many an oak of lofty leaf he fells, 

And strews with thick-branch'd pines the mountain dells : 

He stoops to earth ; the crash is heard around ; 

The depth of forest rolls the roar of sound. 

The beasts their cowering tails with trembling fold, 

And shrink and shudder at the gusty cold ; 

Thick is the hairy coat, the shaggy skin, 

But that all-chilling breath shall pierce within. 

Not his rough hide can then the ox avail ; 

The long-hair'd goat, defenceless, feels the gale : 

Yet vain the north wind's rushing strength to wound 

The flock with sheltering fleeces fenced around. 

He bows the old man crook'd beneath the storm, 

But spares the soft-skinn'd virgin's tender form. 

Screened by her mother's roof on wintry nights, 

And strange to golden Venus' mystic rites, 

The suppling waters of the bath she swims, 

With shiny ointment sleeks her dainty limbs ; 

Within her chamber laid on downy bed, 

While winter howls in tempest o'er her head. 

Now gnaws the boneless polypus his feet, 
Starved 'midst bleak rocks, his desolate retreat ; 
For now no more the sun, with gleaming ray, 
Through seas transparent lights him to his prey. 
And now the horned and unhorned kind, 
Whose lair is in the wood, sore-famished, grind 
Their sounding jaws, and, chilled and quaking, fly 
Where oaks the mountain dells embranch on high : 
They seek to couch in thickets of the glen, 
Or lurk, deep sheltered, in some rocky den. 
Like aged men, who, propp'd on crutches, tread 
Tottering, with broken strength and stooping head, 
So move the beasts of earth, and, creeping low, 
Shun the white flakes and dread the drifting snow. 

Trans, by Elton. 



192 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

The Theogony embraces subjects of a higher order 
than the Works and Days. " It ascends," says Thirl- 
wall, "to the birth of the gods and the origin of nature, 
and unfolds the whole order of the world in a series of 
genealogies, which personify the beings of every kind 
contained in it." A late writer of prominence says that 
" it was of greater value to the Greeks than the Works 
and Days, as it contained an authorized version of the 
genealogy of their gods and heroes — an inspired diction- 
ary of mythology — from which to deviate was hazard- 
ous." x This work, however, has not the poetical merit 
of the other, although there are some passages in it of 
fascinating power and beauty. "The famous passage 
describing the Styx," says Professor Mahaffy, " shows 
the poet to have known and appreciated the wild scen- 
ery of the river Styx in Arcadia ; and the description of 
Sleep and Death, which immediately precedes it, is like- 
wise of great beauty. The conflict of the gods and Ti- 
tans 2 has a splendid crash and thunder about it, and is 
far superior in conception, though inferior in execution, 
to the battle of the gods in the Iliad?* The poems of 
Hesiod early became popular with the country popula- 
tion of Greece ; but in the cities, and especially in Sparta, 
where war was considered the only worthy pursuit, they 
were long cast aside for the more heroic lines of Homer. 



II. LYRIC POETRY. 

From the time of Homer, down to about 560 b.c, 
many kinds of composition for which the Greeks were 
subsequently distinguished were practically unknown. 
We are told that the drama was in its infancy, and that 
prose writing, although more or less practised during 

i "The Greek Poets," by John Aldington Symonds. 2 See page 21. 
3 Mahtiffy's " History of Classical Greek Literature," vol. i., p. 111. 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 193 

this period for purposes of utility or necessity, was not 
cultivated as a branch of popular literature. There was 
another kind of composition, however, which was carried 
to its highest perfection in the last stage of the epic 
period, and that was lyric poetry. But of the master- 
pieces of lyric poetry only a few fragments remain. 

CALLTNUS. 

The first representative of this school that we may 
mention was Callinus, an Ephesian of the latter part of 
the eighth century B.C., to whom the invention of the 
elegiac distich, the # characteristic form of the Ionian poe- 
try, is attributed. Among the few fragments from this 
poet is the following fine war elegy, occasioned, proba- 
bly, by a Persian invasion of Asia Minor: 

How long will ye slumber? when will ye take heart, , 

And fear the reproach of your neighbors at hand? 
Fie ! comrades, to think ye have peace for your part, 

"While the sword and. the arrow are wasting our land ! 
Shame ! Grasp the shield close ! cover well the bold breast ! 

Aloft raise the spear as ye march on the foe ! 
^Yith no thought of retreat, with no terror confessed, 

Hurl your last dart in dying, or strike your last blow. 
Oh, 'tis noble and glorious to fight for our all — 

For our country, our children, the wife of our love ! 
Death comes not the sooner; no soldier shall fall 

Ere his thread is spun out by the sisters above. 1 
Once to die is man's doom : rush, rush to the fight ! 

He cannot escape though his blood were Jove's own. 
For a while let him cheat the shrill arrow by flight; 

Fate will catch him at last in his chamber alone. 



1 The " sisters " here alluded to were the Par'cce, or Fates— three god- 
desses who presided over the destinies of mortals: 1st, Clo'tho, who held 
the distaff; 2d, Lach'esis, who spun each one's portion of the thread of 
life; and, 3d, At'ropos, who cut off the thread with her scissors. 

Clotho and Lachesis, whose boundless sway, 

With Atropos, both men and gods obey! Hesiod. 

9 



194 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Unlamented he dies— u n regretted ? Not so 

When, the tower of his country, in death falls the brave ; 

Thrice hallowed his name among all, high or low, 
As with blessings alive, so with tears in the grave. 

Trans, by H. N. Coleridge. 

ARCHIL'OCHUS. 

Next in point of time comes Archilochus of Pa'ros, 
a satirist who flourished between 714 and 676 b.c. He 
is generally considered to be the first Greek poet who 
wrote in the Iambic measure; but there are evidences 
that this measure existed before his time. This poet 
was betrothed to the daughter of a noble of Paros ; but 
the father, probably tempted by the alluring offers of a 
richer suitor, forbade the nuptials. Archilochus there- 
upon composed so bitter a lampoon upon the family that 
the daughters of the nobleman are said to have hanged 
themselves. Says Symokds, "He made Iambic metre 
his own, and sharpened it into a terrible weapon of at- 
tack. Each verse he wrote was polished, and pointed 
like an arrow-head. Each line was steeped in the poison 
of hideous charges against his sweetheart, her sisters, 

and her father." 1 

Thenceforth Archilochus led a wandering life, full of 
vicissitudes, but replete with evidences of his merit. 
" While Hesiod was in the poor and backward parts of 
central Greece, modifying with timid hand the tone and 
style of epic poetry, without abandoning its form, Ar- 
chilochus, storm-tossed amid wealth and poverty, amid 
commerce and war, amid love and hate, ever in exile 
and yet everywhere at home— Archilochus broke alto- 
gether with the traditions of literature, and colonized 
new territories with his genius." 2 He is said to have re- 



i " The Greek Poets ;" First Series, p. 108. 
2 « Classical Greek Literature," vol. i., p. 157. 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 195 

turned to Paros a short time before his death, where, on 
account of a victory he had won at the Olympic festi- 
val, the resentment and hatred formerly entertained 
against him were turned into gratitude and admiration. 
His death, which occurred on the field of battle, could 
not extinguish his fame, and his memory was celebrated 
by a festival established by his countrymen, during 
which his verses were sung alternately with the poems 
of Homer. " Thus," says an old historian, " by a fatal- 
ity frequently attending men of genius, he spent a life 
of misery, and acquired honor after death. Eeproach, 
ignominy, contempt, poverty, and persecution were the 
ordinary companions of his person ; admiration, glory, 
respect, splendor, and magnificence were the attendants 
of his shade." With the exception of Homer, no poet of 
classical antiquity acquired so high a celebrity. Among 
the Greeks and Romans he was equally esteemed. Cic- 
ero classed him with Sophocles, Pindar, and even Ho- 
mer ; Plato called him the " wisest of poets ;" and Longi- 
nus "speaks with rapture of the torrent of his divine 
inspiration." 

ALC'MAN. 

Passing over Simonides of Amorgos, who is chiefly 
celebrated for a very ungallant but ingenious and 
smooth satire on women, and over Tyrtee'us, whose ani- 
mating and patriotic odes, as we have seen, proved the 
safety of Sparta in one of the Messenian wars, we come 
to the first truly lyric poet of Greece— Alcman— origi- 
nally a Lydian slave in a Spartan family, but emancipated 
by his master on account of his genius. He flourished 
after the second Messenian war, and his poems partake 
of the character of this period, which was one of pleas- 
ure and peace. They are chiefly erotic, or amatory, or 
in celebration of the enjoyments of social life. He suc- 
cessfully cultivated choral poetry, and his Parthenia, 



196 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

made up of a variety of subjects, was composed to be 
sung by the maidens of Tayge'tus. " His excellence," 
says Mure, " appears to have lain in his descriptive pow- 
ers. The best, and one of the longest extant passages 
of his works is a description of sleep, or rather of night ; 
a description unsurpassed, perhaps unrivalled, by any 
similar passage in the Greek or any other language, and 
which has been imitated or paraphrased by many dis- 
tinguished poets." x The following is this author's trans- 
lation of it : 

Now o'er the drowsy earth still night prevails. 

Calm sleep the mountain tops and shady vales, 

The rugged cliffs and hollow glens ; 

The wild beasts slumber in their dens, 

The cattle on the hill. Deep in the sea 

The countless finny race and monster brood 

Tranquil repose. Even the busy bee 

Forgets her daily toil. The silent wood 

No more with noisy hum of insect rings; 

And all the feathered tribes, by gentle sleep subdued, 

Roost in the glade, and hang their drooping wings. 

ARI'ON AND STESICH'ORUS. 

Arion, the greater part of whose life was spent at the 
court of Periander, despot of Corinth, and Stesichorus, 
of Himera, in Sicily, who flourished about 608 B.C., were 
two Greek poets especially noted for the improvements 
they made in choral poetry. The former invented the 
wild, irregular, and impetuous dithyramb, 2 originally a 
species of lyric poetry in honor of Bacchus; but of his 
works there is not a single fragment extant. The lat- 
ter's original name was Tis'ias, and he was called Ste- 



i " History of Greek Literature," vol. iii., p. 205. 

2 From Dithyrambus, one of the appellations of Bacchus. 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 197 

sichorns, which signifies a " leader of choruses." A late 
historian characterizes him as "the first to break the 
monotony of the choral song, which had consisted previ- 
ously of nothing more than one uniform stanza, by di- 
viding it into the Strophe, the Antistrophe, and the Ep- 
odus — the turn, the return, and the rest." Professor 
Mahaffy observes of him as follows: "Finding the 
taste for epic recitation decaying, he undertook to re- 
produce epic stories in lyric dress, and present the sub- 
stance of the old epics in rich and varied metres, and 
with the measured movements of a trained chorus. This 
was a direct step to the drama, for when any one mem- 
ber of the chorus came to stand apart and address the 
rest of the choir, we have already the essence of Greek 
tragedy before us." 1 The works of Stesichorus com- 
prised hymns in honor of the gods and in praise of 
heroes, love-songs, and songs of revelry. 

ALC2&US. 

Among the lyric poets of Greece some writers assign 
the very first place to Alcsens, a native of Lesbos, who 
flourished about 610 b.c, and who has been styled the 
ardent friend and defender of liberty, more because he 
talked so well of patriotism than because of his deeds in 
its behalf. The poet Akenside, however, calls him " the 
Lesbian patriot," and thus contrasts his style with that 
of Anac'reon : 

Broke from the fetters of his native land, 

Devoting shame and vengeance to her lords, 
With louder impulse and a threat'nino- hand 

The Lesbian patriot smites the sounding chords : 
"Ye wretches, ye perfidious train! 
Ye cursed of gods and free-born men ! 



1 "Classical Greek Literature," vol. i., p. 203. 



198 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Ye murderers of the laws ! 

Though now ye glory in your lust, 

Though now ye tread the feeble neck in dust, 

Yet Time and righteous Jove will judge your dreadful cause." 

The poems of Alcseus were principally war and drink- 
ing songs of great beauty, and it is said that they fur- 
nished to the Latin poet Horace " not only a metrical 
model, but also the subject-matter of some of his most 
beautiful odes." The poet fought in the war between 
Athens and Mityle'ne (606 B.C.), and enjoyed the repu- 
tation of being a brave and skilful warrior, although on 
one occasion he is said to have fled from the field of bat- 
tle leaving his arms behind him. Of his warlike odes 
we have a specimen in the following description of the 
martial embellishment of his own house: 

The Spoils of War. 

Glitters with brass my mansion wide ; 
The roof is decked on every side, 

In martial pride, 
With helmets ranged in order bright, 
And plumes of horse-hair nodding white, 

A gallant sight ! 
Fit ornament for warrior's brow — 
And round the walls in goodly row 

Refulgent glow 
Stout greaves of brass, like burnished gold, 
And corselets there in many a fold 

Of linen rolled ; 
And shields that, in the battle fray, 
The routed losers of the day 

Have cast away. 
Enboean falchions too are seen, 
With rich-embroidered belts between 
Of dazzling sheen : 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 199 

And gaudy surcoats piled around, 
The spoils of chiefs in war renowned, 

May there be found : 
These, and all else that here you see, 
Are fruits of glorious victory 

Achieved by me. Tram, by Merivale. 

SAPPHO. 

Contemporary with Alcaeus was the poetess Sappho, 
the only female of Greece who ever ranked with the 
illustrious poets of the other sex, and whom Alcseus 
called "the dark-haired, spotless, sweetly smiling Sap- 
pho." Lesbos was the centre of ^Eolian culture, and 
Sappho was the centre of a society of Lesbian ladies 
who applied themselves successfully to literature. Says 
Symonds: "They formed clubs for the cultivation of 
poetry and music. They studied the arts of beauty, 
and sought to refine metrical forms and diction. Nor 
did they confine themselves to the scientific side of art. 
Unrestrained by public opinion, and passionate for the 
beautiful, they cultivated their senses and emotions, and 
indulged their wildest passions." Sappho devoted her 
whole genius to the subject of Love, and her poems 
express her feelings with great freedom. Hence arose 
the charges of a later age, that were made against her 
character. But whatever difference of view may ex- 
ist on this point, there is only one opinion as to her 
poetic genius. She was undoubtedly the greatest erotic 
poet of antiquity. Plato called her the tenth Muse, 
and Solon, hearing one of her poems, prayed that he 
might not die until he had committed it to memory. 
We cannot forbear introducing the following eloquent 
characterization of her writings : 

"ISTo where is a hint whispered that the poetry of 
Sappho is aught but perfect. Of all the poets of the 



200 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

world, of all the illustrious artists of all literatures, 
Sappho is the one whose every word has a peculiar and 
unmistakable perfume, a seal of absolute perfection and 
inimitable grace. In her art she was unerring. Even 
Archilochus seems commonplace when compared with 
her exquisite rarity of phrase. Whether addressing the 
maidens whom, even in Elysium, as Horace says, Sappho 
could not forget, or embodying the profounder yearn- 
ings of an intense soul after beauty which has never on 
earth existed, but which inflames the hearts of noblest 
poets, robbing the eyes of sleep and giving them the 
bitterness of tears to drink — these dazzling fragments, 

1 Which still, like sparkles of Greek fire, 
Burn on through time and ne'er expire,' 

are the ultimate and finished forms of passionate utter- 
ance—diamonds, topazes, and blazing rubies— in which 
the fire of the soul is crystallized forever." ' 

It is related that an associate of Sappho once derided 
her talents, or stigmatized her poetical labors as un- 
suited to her sex and condition. The poetess, burning 
with indignation, thus replied to her traducer: 

Whenever Death shall seize thy mortal frame, 

Oblivion's pen shall blot thy worthless name ; 

For thy rude hand ne'er plucked the beauteous rose 

That on Pie'ria's 2 sky-clad summit blows: 

Thy paltry soul with vilest souls shall go 

To Pluto's kingdom— scenes of endless woe ; 

While I on golden wings ascend to fame, 

And leave behind a muse-enamored, deathless name. 

The memory of this poetess of Love rouses the fol- 
lowing strain of celebration in Antip'ater of Sidon : 

> Syraond's <( Greek Poets," First Series, p.139. 2 See pp. 2 and 9. 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 201 

Does Sappho, then, beneath thy bosom rest, 
^Eolian earth ? that mortal Muse confessed 
Inferior only to the choir above, 
That foster-child of Venus and of Love ; 
Warm from whose lips divine Persuasion came, 
Greece to delight, and raise the Lesbian name? 
O ye, who ever twine the threefold thread, 
Ye Fates, why number with the silent dead 
That mighty songstress, whose unrivalled powers 
Weave for the Muse a crown of deathless flowers? 

Trans, by Francis Hodgson. 

ANACREON. 

The last lyric poet of this period that we shall notice 
was Anacreon, a native of Teos, in Ionia, who flourished 
about 530 b.c. He was a voluptuary, who sang beauti- 
fully of love, and wine, and nature, and who has been 
called the courtier and laureate of tyrants, in whose 
society, and especially in that of Polyc'rates and Hip- 
par'chus, his days were spent. The poet Akenside thus 
characterizes him : 

* 

I see Anacreon smile and sino*, 

His silver tresses breathe perfume; 
His cheeks display a second spring, 

Of roses taught by wine to bloom. 
Away, deceitful cares, away, 
And let" me listen to his lav ; 

Let me the wanton pomp enjoy, 
While in smooth dance the %ht-win<red hours 
Lead round his lyre its patron powers, 

Kind laughter and convivial joy. 

The following is Cowper's translation of a pretty little 
poem by Anacreon on the grasshopper : 

Happy songster, perched above, 
On the summit of the grove, 
9* 



202 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

"Whom a dew-drop cheers to sing 
With the freedom of a king, 
From thy perch survey the fields, 
Where prolific Nature yields 
Naught that, willingly as she, 
Man surrenders not to thee. 
For hostility or hate, 
None thy pleasures can create. 
Thee it satisfies to sing 
Sweetly the return of spring, 
Herald of the genial hours, 
Harming neither herbs nor flowers. 
Therefore man thy voice attends, 
Gladly ; thou and he are friends. 
Nor thy never-ceasing strains 
Phoebus and the Muse disdains 
As too simple or too long, 
For themselves inspire the song. 
Earth-born, bloodless, undecaying, 
Ever singing, sporting, playing, 
What has Nature else to show 
Godlike in its kind as thou ? 



III. EARLY GRECIAN PHILOSOPHY. 

We now enter upon a new phase of Greek literature. 
While the first use of prose in writing may be assigned 
to a date earlier than 700 B.C., it was not until the early 
part of the sixth century b.c. that use was made of prose 
for literary purposes ; and even then prose compositions 
were either mythological, or collections of local legends, 
whether sacred or profane. The importance and the 
practical uses of genuine history were neither known 
nor suspected until after the Persian wars. But Gre- 
cian philosophy had an earlier dawn, and was coeval 
with the poetical compositions of Hesiod, although it 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 203 

was in the sixth century that it began to be separated 
from poetry and religion, and to be cultivated by men 
who were neither bards, priests, nor seers. This is the 
era when the practical maxims and precepts of the seven 
Grecian sages began to be collected by the chroniclers, 
and disseminated among the people. 

TEE SEVEN SAGES. 

Concerning these sages, otherwise called the " Seven 
Wise Men of Greece," the accounts are confused and 
contradictory, and their names are variously given ; but 
those most generally admitted to the honor are Solon 
(the Athenian legislator); Bias, of Ionia; Chi'lo (Ephor 
of Sparta) ; Cleobu'lus (despot of Lindus, in the Island 
of Ehodes) ; Perian'der (despot of Corinth) ; Pit'tacus 
(ruler of Mityle'ne) ; and Tholes, of Miletus, in accord- 
ance with the following enumeration : 

" First Solon, who made the Athenian laws ; 
While Chilo, in Sparta, was famed for his saws ; 
In Miletus did Thales astronomy teach ; 
Bias used in Prie'ne his morals to preach ; 
Cleobulus of Lindus was handsome and wise ; 
Mitylene 'gainst thraldom saw Pittacus rise ; 
Periander is said to have gained, through his court, 
The title that Myson, the Chenian, ought." 1 

The seven wise men were distinguished for their witty 
sayings, many of which have grown into maxims that 
are in current use even at the present day. Out of the 
number the following seven were inscribed as mottoes, 
in later days, in the temple at Delphi : " Know thyself,"' 
Solon; "Consider the end," Chilo; "Suretyship is the 
forerunner of ruin " (He that hateth suretyship is sure, 

1 It is Plato who says that Periatfuer, tyrant of Corinth, should o-i ve 
place to Myson. ° 



204 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Prov. xi. 15), Tholes; "Most men are "bad" (There is 
none that doeth good, no, not one, Psalm xiv. 3), Bias; 
" Avoid extremes " (the golden mean), Cleobulus ; " Know 
thy opportunity " (Seize time by the forelock), Pittacus ; 
" Nothing is impossible to industry " (Patience and perse- 
verance overcome mountains), Periander. Grote says 
of the seven sages: "Their appearance forms an epoch 
in Grecian history, inasmuch as they are the first per- 
sons who ever acquired an Hellenic reputation grounded 
on mental competency apart from poetical genius or ef- 
fect — a proof that political and social prudence was begin- 
ning to be appreciated and admired on its own account." 
The eldest school of Greek philosophy, called the 
Ionian, was founded by Thales of Miletus, about the 
middle of the sixth century b.c. In the investigation 
of natural causes and effects he taught, as a distinguish- 
ing tenet of his philosophy, that water, or some other 
fluid, is the primary element of all things— a theory 
which probably arose from observations on the uses of 
moisture in the nourishment of animal and vegetable 
life. A similar process of reasoning led Anaxim'enes, 
of Miletus, half a century later, to substitute air for 
water ; and by analogous reasoning Hercicli'tus, of Eph- 
esus, surnamed " the naturalist," was led to regard the 
basis of fire or flame as the fundamental principle of 
all things, both spiritual and material. Diog'enes, the 
Cretan, was led to regard the universe as issuing from 
an intelligent principle — a rational as well as sensitive 
sou l_but without recognizing any distinction between 
mind and matter; while Anaximan'der conceived the 
primitive state of the universe to have been a vast chaos 
or infinity, containing the elements from which the world 
was constructed by inherent or self-moving processes of 
separation and combination. This doctrine was revived 
by Anaxag'oras, an Ionian, a century later, who com- 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 205 

bined it with the philosophy of Diogenes, and taught 
the existence of one supreme mind. 

XEXOPH'ANES AND PYTHAG'ORAS. 

Two widely different schools of philosophy now arose 
in the western Greek colonies of lower Italy. Xenoph- 
anes, a native of Ionia, who had fled to E'lea, was the 
founder of one, and Pythagoras, of Samos, of the other. 
The former, known as the Eleat'ic philosophy, admitted 
a supreme intelligence, eternal and incorporeal, pervad- 
ing all things, and, like the universe itself, spherical in 
form. This system was developed in the following cen- 
tury by Parmen'ides and Zeno, who exercised a great in- 
fluence upon the Greek mind. Pythagoras was the first 
Grecian to assume the title of philosopher, although he 
was more of a religious teacher. Having travelled ex- 
tensively in the East, he returned to Samos about 540 
b.c. ; but, finding the condition of his country, which 
was then ruled by the despot Polycrates, unfavorable 
to the progress of his doctrines, he moved to Croto'na, 
in Italy, and established his school of philosophy there. 

Pythagoras, 
Vexed with the Samian despot's lawless sway 
(For tyrants ne'er loved wisdom), crossed the seas, 
And found a home on the Hesperian shore, 
Time when the Tarquin arched the infant Rome 
With vaults, the germ of Cesar's golden hall. 
There, in Crotona's state, he held a school 
Of wisdom and of virtue, teaching men 
The harmony of aptly portioned powers, 
And of well-numbered days : whence, as a god, 
Men honored him ; and, from his wells refreshed, 
The master-builder of pure intellect, 
Imperial Plato, piled the palace where 
All great, true thoughts have found a home forever. 

J. Stuart Blackie. 



1 



206 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Pythagoras made some important discoveries in ge- 
ometry, music, and astronomy. The demonstration of 
the forty-seventh proposition of Euclid is attributed to 
him. He also discovered the chords in music, which 
led him to conceive that the planets, striking upon the 
ether through which they move in their celestial orbits, 
produce harmonious sounds, varying according to the 
differences of the magnitudes, velocities, and relative 
distances of the planets, in a manner corresponding to 
the proportion of the notes in a musical scale. Hence 
the " music of the spheres." From what can be gath- 
ered of the astronomical doctrine of Pythagoras, it has 
been inferred that he was possessed of the true idea of 
the solar system, which was revived by Coper'nicus and 
fully established by Newton. With respect to God, 
Pythagoras appears to have taught that he is the uni- 
versal, ever-existent mind, the first principle of the uni- 
verse, the source and cause of all animal life and motion, 
in substance similar to light, in nature like truth, inca- 
pable of pain, invisible, incorruptible, and only to be 
comprehended by the mind. His philosophy and teach- 
ings are thus pictured by the poet Thomson : 

Here dwelt the Samian sage ; to him belongs 

The brightest witness of recording fame. 

He sought Crotona's pure, salubrious air, 

And through great Greece his gentle wisdom taught. 

His mental eye first launched into the deeps 

Of boundless ether ; where unnumbered orbs, 

Myriads on myriads, through the pathless sky 

Unerring roll, and wind their steady way. 

There he the full consenting choir beheld ; 

There first discerned the secret band of love, 

The kind attraction, that to central suns 

Binds circling earths, and world with world unites. 

Instructed thence, he great ideas formed 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 207 

Of the whole-moving, all-informing God, 

The Sun of Beings ! beaming unconfined — 

Light, life, and love, and ever active power : 

Whom naught can image, and who best approves 

The silent worship of the moral heart, 

That joys in bounteous Heaven and spreads the joy. 

Pythagoras also taught the doctrine of the transmi- 
gration of souls, which lie probably derived from the 
Egyptians; and he professed to preserve a distinct re- 
membrance of several states of existence through which 
his sonl had passed. It is related of him that on one 
occasion, seeing a dog beaten, he interceded in its behalf, 
saying, " It is the sonl of a friend of mine, whom I rec- 
ognize by its voice." It would seem as if the poet Cole- 
ridge had at times been dimly conscious of the reality 
of this Pythagorean doctrine, for he says : 

Oft o'er my brain does that strange fancy roll 

Which makes the present (while the flash doth last) 
Seem a mere semblance of some unknown past, 
Mixed with such feelings as perplex the soul 
Self-questioned in her sleep : and some have said 
We lived ere yet this robe of flesh we wore. 

One of our favorite American poets, Lowell, indulges 
in a like fancy in the following lines from that dream- 
like, exquisite fantasy, " In the Twilight," found in the 
Biglow Papers: 

Sometimes a breath floats bv me, 
An odor from Dream-land sent, 
That makes the ghost seem nigh me 
Of a splendor that came and went, 
Of a life lived somewhere, I know not 

In what diviner sphere — 
Of memories that stay not and go not, 
Like music once heard by an car 



208 • MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

That cannot forget or reclaim it — 
A something so shy, it would shame it 

To make it a show — 
A something too vague, could I name it, 

For others to know, 
As if I had lived it or dreamed it, 
As if I had acted or schemed it, 
Long ago ! 

And yet, could I live it over, 

This life that stirs in my brain — 
Could I be both maiden and lover, 
Moon and tide, bee and clover, 

As I seem to have been, once again — 
Could I but speak and show it, 

This pleasure, more sharp than pain, 
That baffles and lures me so, 
The world should not lack a poet, 
Such as it had 
In the ages glad 
Long ago. 

On the whole, the system of Pythagoras, with many 
excellencies, contained some gross absurdities and super- 
stitions, which were dignified with the name of philoso- 
phy, and which exerted a pernicious influence over the 
opinions of many succeeding generations. 

THE ELEUSIN'IAN MYSTERIES. 

Closely connected with the public and private instruc- 
tion that the philosophers gave in their various systems, 
were certain national institutions of a secret character, 
which combined the mysteries of both philosophy and 
religion. The most celebrated of these, the great festi- 
val of Eleusinia, sacred to Ce'res and Pros'erpine, was 
observed every fourth year in different parts of Greece, 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 209 

but more particularly by the people of Athens every 
fifth year, at Eleu'sis, in Attica. 

What is known of the rites performed at Eleusis lias 
been gathered from occasional incidental allusions found 
in the pages of nearly all the classical authorities ; and 
although the penalty of a sudden and ignominious death 
impended over any one who divulged these symbolic 
ceremonies, yet enough is now known to describe them 
with much minuteness of detail. We have not the space 
to give that detailed description here, but the ceremo- 
nies occupied nine days, from the 15th to the 23d of 
September, inclusive. The first day was that on which 
the worshippers merely assembled ; the second, that on 
which they purified themselves by bathing in the sea; 
the third, the day of sacrifices; the fourth, the day of 
offerings to the goddess ; the fifth, the day of torches, 
when the multitude roamed over the meadows at mVht- 
fall carrying flambeaus, in imitation of Ceres searching 
for her daughter ; the sixth, the day of Bacchus, the god 
of Vintage ; the seventh, the day of athletic pastimes ; 
the eighth, the day devoted to the lesser mysteries and 
celestial revelations; and the ninth, the day of libations. 

The language that Virgil puts into the mouth of An- 
chi'ses, in the Sixth Book of the jEneid, is regarded as 
a condensed definition of the secrets of Eleusis and the 
creed of Pythagoras. The same book, moreover, is be- 
lieved to represent several of the scenes of the mysteries. 
In the following words the shade of Anchises answers 
the inquiries of "his godlike son :" 

"Know, first, that heav'n, and earth's contracted frame, 
And flowing waters, and the starry flame, 
And both the radiant lights, one common soul 
Inspires and feeds — and animates the whole. 
This active mind, infused through all the space, 
Unites and mingles with the mighty mass. 



210 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Hence men and beasts the breath of life obtain, 
And birds of air, and monsters of the main. 
Th' ethereal vigor is in all the same ; 
And ev'ry soul is fill'd with equal flame — 
As much as earthy limbs, and gross allay 
Of mortal members subject to decay, 
Blunt not the beams of heav'n and edge of day. 
From this coarse mixture of terrestrial parts, 
Desire and fear by turns possess their hearts, 
And grief and joy : nor can the grovelling mind, 
In the dark dungeon of the limbs confined, 
Assert the native skies, or own its heav'nly kind : 
Nor death itself can wholly wash their stains ; 
But long-contracted filth ev'n in the soul remains. 

" The relics of in vet' rate vice they wear 

And spots of sin obscene in ev'ry face appear. 

For this are various penances enjoin'd ; 

And some are hung to bleach upon the wind, 

Some plunged in waters, others purged in fires, 

Till all the dregs are drain'd, and all the rust expires. 

All have their ma'nes, and those manes bear : 

The few, so cleansed, to these abodes repair, 

And breathe, in ample fields, the soft Elysian air. 

Then are they happy, when by length of time 

The scurf is worn away of each committed crime ; 

No speck is left of their habitual stains, 

But the pure ether of the soul remains. 

But, when a thousand rolling years are past 

(So long their punishments and penance last), 

Whole droves of minds are, by the driving god, 

Compell'd to drink the deep Lethe'an flood, 

In large forgetful draughts to steep the cares 

Of their past labors and their irksome years, 

That, unrememb'ring of its former pain, 

The soul may suffer mortal flesh again." 

Trans, by Drtden. 



PKOGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 211 
IV. ARCHITECTURE. 

In architecture and sculpture Greece stands pre-emi- 
nently above all other nations. The first evidences of 
the former art that we discover are in the gigantic walls 
of Tiryns, Mycenae, and other Greek cities, constructed 
for purposes of "defence in the very earliest periods of 
Greek history, and generally known by the name of 
Cyclo'pean, because supposed by the early Greeks to 
have been built by those fabled giants, the Cyelo'pes. 

Yc cliffs of masonry, enormous piles, 

Which no rude censure of familiar time 
Nor record of our puny race defiles, 

In dateless mystery ye stand sublime, 
Memorials of an a^e of which we see 
Only the types in things that once were ye. 

Whether ye rest upon some bosky knoll, 

Your feet by ancient myrtles beautified, 
Or seem, like fabled dragons, to unroll 

Your swarthy grandeurs down a bleak hill-side, 
Still on your savage features is a spell 
That makes ye half divine, ineffable. 

With joy upon your height I stand alone, 

As on a precipice, or lie within 
Your shadow wide, or leap from stone to stone, 

Pointing my steps with careful discipline, 
And think of those grand limbs whose nerve could bear 
These masses to their places in mid-air: 

Of Anakira, and Titans, and of days 

Saturn ian, when the spirit of man was knit 

So close to Nature that his best essays 
At Art were but in all to follow it, 

In all — dimension, dignity, degree ; 

And thus these mighty things were made to be. 

Lord Houghton. 



212 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

It was in the erection of the temples of the gods, 

however, that Grecian architecture had its ornamental 

origin, and also made its most rapid progress. The 

primeval altar, differing but little from a common 

hearth, was supplanted by the wooden habitation of the 

god, and the latter in turn gave way to the temple of 

stone. Then rapidly rose the three famed orders of 

I architecture— the Doric, the Ionic, and the Corinthian 

the first solemn, massive, and imposing, while the 

others exhibit, in their ornamental features, a gradual 

advance to perfection. 

First, unadorned, 

And nobly plain, the manly Doric rose ; 

The Ionic then, with decent matron grace, 

Her airy pillar heaved ; luxuriant last, 

The rich Corinthian spread her wanton wreath. 

Thomson. 

Passing over the earlier structures devoted to pur- 
poses of worship, we find at the beginning of the sixth 
century several magnificent temples in course of erec- 
tion. Among these the most celebrated were the Tem- 
ple of He'ra (Juno), at Samos, and the Temple of Ar'- 
temis (Diana), at Ephesus. The order of architecture 
adopted in the first was Doric, and in the second Ionic. 
Both were built of white marble. The former was 346 
feet in length and 189 feet in breadth ; while the latter 
was 425 feet long and 220 feet broad. Its columns 
were 127 in number, and 60 feet in height; and the 
blocks of marble composing the architrave, or chief 
beams resting immediately on the columns, were 30 
feet in length. 

CHER'STPHRON, AND THE TEMPLE OF DIANA. 

The great Temple of Diana was commenced under 
the supervision of Chersiphron, an architect of Crete, 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 213 

but it occupied over two hundred years in building. 
It is related of Chersiphron that, having erected the 
jambs of the great door to the temple, he failed, after 
repeated efforts, continued for many days, to bring the 
massive lintel to its place in line with the jambs. He 
finally sank down in despair, and fell asleep. In his 
dreams he saw the divine form of the goddess, who 
assured him that those who labored for the gods should 
not go unrewarded. On awaking he beheld the mas- 
sive lintel in its proper place, laid there by the hand of 
the goddess herself. An American sculptor and poet 
relates the incident, and gives its moral in the following 
poem : 

When to the utmost we have tasked our powers, 
And Nem'esis still frowns and shakes her head ; 
When, wearied out and baffled, we confess 
Our utter weakness, and the tired hand drops, 
And Hope flees from us, and in blank despair 
We sink to earth, the face, so stern before, 
August will smile— the hand before withdrawn 
Reach out the help we vainly pleaded for, 
Take up our task, and in a moment do 
What all our strength was powerless to achieve. 

Unless the gods smile, human toil is vain. 
The crowning blessing of all work is drawn 
Not from ourselves, bub from the powers above. 
And this none better knew than Chersiphron, 
When on the plains of Ephesus he reared 
The splendid temple built to Artemis. 
With patient labor he had placed at last 
The solid jambs on either side the door, 
And now for many a weary day he strove 
With many a plan and many a fresh device, 
Still seeking and still failing, on the jambs 
Level to lay the lintel's massive weight : 



214 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Still it defied him ; and, worn out at last, 
Along the steps he laid him down at night. 
Sleep would not come. With dull distracting pain 
The problem hunted through his feverish thoughts, 
Till in his dark despair he longed for death, 
And threatened his own life with his own hand. 

Peace came at last upon him, and he slept ; 

And in his sleep, before his dreaming eyes 

He saw the form divine of Artemis : 

O'er him she bent and smiled, and softly said, 

" Live, Chersiphron! Who labor for the gods 

The gods reward. Behold, your work is done I" 

Then, like a mist that melts into the sky, 

She vanished ; and awaking, he beheld, 

Laid by her hand above the entrance-door, 

The ponderous lintel level on the jambs. 

r W. W. Story. 

Another celebrated temple of this period was that of 
Delphi, which was rebuilt, after its destruction by fire in 
548 b.c, at a cost equivalent to more than half a million 
of dollars. It was in the Doric style, and was faced with 
Parian marble. About the same time the Temple of 
Olympian Jove was commenced or restored at Athens 
by Pisistratus. All the temples mentioned have nearly 
disappeared. That of Diana, at Ephesus, was burned by 
Heros'tratus, in order to immortalize his name, on the 
night that Alexander the Great was born (356 b.c). It 
was subsequently rebuilt with greater magnificence, and 
enriched by the" genius of Sco'pas, Praxiteles, Parrha'- 
sius, ApeVles, and other celebrated sculptors and paint- 
ers. A few of its columns support the dome of the 
Church of St. Sophia at Constantinople, two of its pil- 
lars are in the great church at Pi'sa, and recent excava- 
tions have brought to light portions of its foundation. 
Other temples, however, erected as far back as the fourth 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 215 

and fifth centuries, have more successfully resisted the 
ravages of time. Among these are the six, of the Doric 
order, whose ruins appear at Selinus, in Sicily ; while at 
Psestum, in Southern Italy, are the celebrated ruins of 
two temples, which, witli the exception of the temple of 
Corinth, are the most massive examples of Doric archi- 
tecture extant. " It was in the larger of these two tem- 
ples," says a visitor, "during the moonlight of a trou- 
bled sky, that we experienced the emotions of the awful 
and sublime, such as impress a testimony, never to be 
forgotten, of the power of art over the affections." 

There, down Salerno's bay, 
In deserts far away, 
Over whose solitudes 
The dread malaria broods, 
No labor tills the land — 
Only the fierce brigand, 
Or shepherd, wan and lean, 
O'er the wide plains is seen. 
Yet there, a lovely dream, 
There Grecian temples gleam, 
Whose form and mellowed tone 
Rival the Parthenon. 
The Sybarite no more 
Comes hither to adore, 
With perfumed offering, 
The ocean god and king. 
The deity is fled 
Long since, but, in his stead, 
The smiling sea is seen, 
The Doric shafts between ; 
And round the time-worn base 
Climb viaes of tender orace, 
And Paestum's roses still 
The air with fragrance fill. 

Christopher P. Cranch. 



216 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

V. SCULPTURE. 

Like architecture, sculpture, or, more properly speak- 
ing, statuary, owed its origin to religion, and was intro- 
duced into Greece from Egypt. With the Egyptians 
the art never advanced beyond the types established at 
its birth ; but the Greeks, led on, as a recent writer well 
says, " by an intuitive sense of beauty which was with 
them almost a religious principle, aimed at an ideal per- 
fection, and, by making Nature in her most perfect forms 
their model, acquired a facility and a power of represent- 
ing every class of form unattained by any other people, 
and which have rendered the (terms Greek and perfec- 
tion, with reference to art, almost synonymous." The 
first specimens of Greek sculpture were rough, unhewn 
wooden representations of the gods. These were fol- 
lowed, a little later, by wooden images having some re- 
semblance to life, and clothed and decorated with orna-' 
ments of various kinds. While this branch of the art 
long remained in a rude state, sculptured figures on 
architectural monuments were executed in a superior 
style as early as the age of Homer. 

Long before the period of authentic history, other 
materials than wood were used in making statues ; and 
as early as 700 b.c. a statue was executed of Zeus, or 
Jupiter, in bronze. The art of soldering metals is at- 
tributed to Glaucus of Chios, about 690 b.c. ; while to 
Khce'cus and his son Theodo'rus, of Samos, is ascribed 
the invention of modelling and casting figures of bronze 
in a mould. The use of marble, also, for statues, was 
introduced in the early part of the sixth century by 
Dipce/nus and Scyl'lis of Crete, who are the first artists 
celebrated for works in this material. But, while these 
improvements were important, they did not necessarily 
involve any change in style; and it was the removal of 



PROGRESS OF LITERATURE AND THE ARTS. 217 

the restraints imposed by religion and hereditary culti- 
vation that laid the foundation for the rapid progress 
of the art and its subsequent perfection. These changes, 
and the results produced by them, are well summed up 
in the following extract from Thirl wall : 

" The principal cause of the progress of sculpture was 
the enlargement which it experienced in the range of its 
subjects, and the consequent multiplicity of its produc- 
tions. As long as statues were confined to the interior 
of the temples, and no more were seen in each sanctuary 
than the idol of its worship, there was little room and 
motive for innovation ; and, on the other hand, there 
were strong inducements for adhering to the practice of 
antiquity. But, insensibly, piety or ostentation began to 
fill the temples with groups of gods and heroes, stran- 
gers to the place, and guests of the power who was prop- 
erly invoked there. The deep recesses of their pedi- 
ments were peopled with colossal forms, exhibiting some 
legendary scene appropriate to the place or the occasion 
of the building. The custom of honoring the victors 
at the public games with a statue— an honor afterward 
extended to other distinguished persons— contributed, 
perhaps, still more to the same effect ; for, whatever re- 
straints may have been imposed on the artists in the 
representation of sacred subjects, either by usage or by 
a religious scruple, these were removed when the artists 
were employed in exhibiting the images of mere mor- 
tals. As the field of the art was widened to embrace 
new objects, the number of masters increased; they 
were no longer limited, where this had before been the 
case, to families or guilds ; their industry was sharpened 
by a more active competition and by richer rewards. 
As the study of nature became more earnest, the sense 
of beauty grew quicker and steadier; and so rapid was 
the march of the art, that the last vestiges of the arbi- 

10 



218 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

trary forms which had been hallowed by time or relig- 
ion had not yet everywhere disappeared when the final 
union of truth and beauty, which we sometimes en- 
deavor to express by the term ideal, was accomplished 
in the school of Phid'ias." ' 

We cannot attempt to give here the names of the 
masters of sculpture who flourished prior to 500 B.C., or 
trace the still extant remains of their genius ; but their 
works were numerous, and the beauty and grandeur of 
many of them caused them to be highly valued in all 
succeeding ages. In fact, before the Persian wars had 
commenced, the branch of sculpture termed statuary had 
attained nearly the summit of its perfection. 



i Tbirlwall's "History of Greece," vol i., p. 206. 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 219 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE PERSIAN WARS. 

Returning now to the political and military history 
of Greece, we find that, about the year 550 b.c, the in- 
dependence of the Grecian colonies on the coast of Asia 
Minor was crushed by Crce'sus, King of Lydia, who con- 
quered their territories. Thus the Asiatic Greeks be- 
came subject to a barbarian power; but Croesus ruled 
them with great mildness, leaving their political insti- 
tutions undisturbed, and requiring of them little more 
than the payment of a moderate tribute. A few years 
later they experienced a change of masters, and, together 
with Lydia, fell by conquest under the dominion of Per- 
sia, of which Cyrus the elder was then king. Under 
Darius Hystas'pes, the second king after Cyrus, the Per- 
sian empire attained its greatest extent— embracing, in 
Asia, all that at a later period was contained in Persia 
proper and Turkey ; in Africa taking in Egypt as far as 
Nubia, and the coast of the Mediterranean as far as 
Barca; thus stretching from the JEgean Sea to the In- 
dus, and from the plains of Tartary to the cataracts of 
the Nile. Such was the empire against whose united 
strength a few Grecian communities were soon to con- 
tend for the preservation of their very name and exist- 
ence. 

I. THE IONIC REVOLT. 

^ Like the Lydians, the Persians ruled the Greek colo- 
nies with a degree of moderation, and permitted them 



220 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

to retain their own form of government by paying trib- 
ute ; yet the Greeks seized every opportunity to deliver 
themselves from this species of thraldom, and in 502 b.c. 
an insurrection broke out in one of the Ionian states, 
which soon assumed a formidable character. Before the 
Persians could collect sufficient forces to quell the re- 
volt, the Ionians sought the aid of their Grecian coun- 
trymen, making application first to Sparta, but in vain, 
and then to Athens and the islands of the ^Egean Sea. 
The Athenians, regarding Darius as an avowed enemy, 
gladly took -part with the Ionians, and, in connection 
with Euboe'a, furnished them a fleet of twenty-five ves- 
sels. The allied Grecians, though at first successful, 
were defeated near Ephesus with great loss. Their com- 
manders then quarrelled, and the Athenians sailed for 
home, leaving the Asiatic Greeks (divided among them- 
selves) to contend alone against the whole power of Per- 
sia. Still, the revolt attained to considerable propor- 
tions, and was protracted during a period of six years. 
It was terminated by the capture of Miletus, the capital 
of the Ionian Confederacy, in 495 b.c. The inhabitants 
of this city who escaped the sword were carried into cap- 
tivity by the conquerors, and the subjugation of Ionia 

was complete. 

The principal achievement of the allied Grecians 
during this war was the burning of Sardis, the capi- 
tal of the old Lydian monarchy. When Darius was 
informed of it he burst into a paroxysm of rage, di- 
recting his wrath chiefly against the Athenians and Eu- 
boeans who had dared to invade his dominions. "The 
Athenians !" he exclaimed, " who are they ?" Upon be- 
ing told, he took his bow and shot an arrow high into 
the air, saying, " Grant me, Jove, to take vengeance upon 
the Athenians." He also charged one of his attendants 
to call aloud to him thrice every day at dinner, " Sire, 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 221 

remember the Athenians !" As soon, therefore, as Da- 
rius had satisfied his vengeance against the Greek cities 
and islands of Asia, he turned his attention to the Athe- 
nians and Euboeans, in pursuance of his vow. He medi- 
tated, however, nothing less than the conquest of all 
Greece ; but the Persian fleet that was to aid in carry- 
ing out his plans was checked in its progress, off Mount 
Athos, by a storm so violent that it is said to have de- 
stroyed three hundred vessels and over twenty thousand 
lives; and his son-in-law, Mardo'nius, who had entered 
Thrace and Macedon at the head of a large army, ab- 
ruptly terminated his campaign and recrossed the Hel- 
lespont to Asia. 

II. THE FIRST PERSIAN WAR. >-j-Q o X5 .C , 

Darius, having renewed his preparations for the con- 
quest of Greece, sent heralds through the Grecian cities, 
demanding earth and water as tokens of submission! 
Some of the smaller states, intimidated by his power, 
submitted ; but Athens and Sparta haughtily rejected 
the demands of the Eastern monarch, and put his her- 
alds to death with cruel mockery, throwing one into a 
pit and another into a well, and bidding them take 
thence their earth and water. 

In the spring of 490 b.c. a Persian fleet of six hun- 
dred ships, conveying an army of 120,000 men, and 
guided by the aged tyrant Hippias, directed its course 
toward the shores of Greece. Several islands of the 
^Egean submitted without a struggle. Euboea was se- 
verely punished ; and with but little opposition the Per- 
sian host landed and advanced to the plains of Marathon, ( / 
within twenty miles of Athens. The Athenians ~SiiTed~on 
the Platseans and the Spartans for aid, and the former 
sent their entire force of one thousand men ; but the 
Spartans refused to give the much-needed help, because 



222 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

it lacked a few days of the full moon, and it was contrary 
to their religious customs to begin a march during this 
interval. Meantime the Athenians had marched to Mar- 
athon, and were encamped on the hills that surrounded 
the plain. Their army numbered ten thousand men, 
and was commanded by Callim'achus, the Pol'em&rch or 
third Archon, and ten generals, among whom were Mil- 
ti'ades, Themis'tocles, and Aristi'des, who subsequently 
acquired immortal fame. Five of the ten generals were 
afraid to hazard a battle without the aid of the Spar- 
tans ; but the arguments of Miltiades finally prevailed 
upon Callimachus to give his casting vote in favor of 
immediate action. Although the ten generals were to 
command the whole army successively, each for one day, 
it was agreed to invest Miltiades with the command at 
once, and intrust to his' military skill the fortunes of 
Athens. He immediately drew up the little army in 
order of battle. 

THE BATTLE OF MARATHON. 

The Persians were extended in a line across the mid- 
dle of the plain, having their best troops in the centre, 
while their fleet was ranged behind them along the 
beach. The Athenians were drawn up in a line oppo- 
site, but having their main strength in the extreme 
wings of their army. Miltiades quickly advanced his 
force across the mile of plain that separated it froin the 
foe, and fell upon the immense army of the Persians. 
As he had foreseen, the centre of his line was soon bro- 
ken, while the extremities of the enemy's line, made up 
of motley and undisciplined bands of all nations, were 
routed and driven toward the shore, and into the adjoin- 
ing morasses. Miltiades now hastily concentrated his 
two wings and directed their united force against the 
Persian centre, which, deeming itself victorious, was 



THE PEKSIAN WARS. 223 

taken completely by surprise. The Persians, defeated, 
fled in disorder to their ships, but many perished in the 
marshes; the shore was strewn with their dead, and 
seven of their ships were destroyed. Their loss was 
six thousand four hundred; that of the Athenians, not 
including the Platseans, only one hundred and ninety- 
two. Such, in brief, was the famous battle of Mara- 
thon. The Persians were strong in the terror of their 
name, and in the renown of their conquests ; and it 
required a most heroic resolution in the Athenians to 
face a danger that they had not yet learned to despise. 

LEGENDS OF THE BATTLE. 

The victory at Marathon was viewed by the people as 
a deliverance by the gods themselves. It is fabled that 
before the battle the voice of the god Pan was heard 
in the mountains, uttering warnings and threatenings 
to the Persians, and inspiring the Greeks with courage. 
Hence the wonderful legends of the battle, in which 
Theseus, Hercules, and other local heroes are represented 
as engaging in the combat, and dealing death among the 
flying barbarians. In the following lines Mbs. Hemans 
has embraced the description which the Greeks gave of 
the appearance and deeds of Theseus on that occasion : 

There was one, a leader crowned, 

And armed for Greece that day ; 
But the falchions made no sound 

On his gleaming war array. 
In the battle's front he stood, 

With his tall and shadowy crest ; 
But the arrows drew no blood, 

Though their path was through his vest. 

His sword was seen to flash 

Where the boldest deeds were done ; 



224 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

But it smote without a clash ; 

The stroke was heard by none ! 
His voice was not of those 

Who swelled the rolling blast, 
And his steps fell hushed like snows — 

'Twas the shade of Theseus passed ! 

Far sweeping through the foe 

With a fiery charge he bore ; 
And the Mede left many a bow 
On the sounding ocean-shore. 
And the foaming waves grew red, 
And the sails were crowded fast, 
When the sons of Asia fled, 

As the shade of Theseus passed ! 
When banners caught the breeze, 
AVhen helms in sunlight shone, 
When masts were on the seas, 
And spears on Marathon. 

It is said that to this day the peasant believes the 
field of Marathon to be haunted with spectral warriors, 
whose shouts are heard at midnight, borne on the wind, 
and rising above the din of battle. Viewed in the light 
of sucli legends, the following poem on Marathon, by 
Peofessor Blackie, is full of interest and poetic beauty : 

From Pentel'icus' pine-clad height 1 

A voice of warning came, 
That shook the silent autumn night 

With fear to Media's name. 2 
Pan, from his Marathonian cave, 3 

Sent screams of midnio-ht terror, 



1 Pentelicus overhangs the south side of the plain of Marathon. 

2 After the absorption of the Median kingdom into that of Persia, the 
terms Mede and Persian were interchangeabty used, with little distinction. 

3 Pan was said to have a famous cave near Marathon. For the some- 
what prominent part which Pan played in the great Persian war, see 
Herodotus, vi., p. 105. 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 225 

And darkling horror curled the wave 
On the broad sea's moonlit mirror. 

Woe, Persia, woe ! thou liest low — low ! 

Let the golden palaces groan ! 
Ye mothers weep for sons that shall sleep 
In gore on Marathon. 

Where Indus and Hydaspes roll, 
Where treeless deserts glow, 
Where Scythians roam beneath the pole, 

O'er hills of hardened snow, 
The great Darius rules : and now, 

Thou little Greece, to thee 
He comes: thou thin-soiled Athens, how 
Shalt thou dare to be free ? 

There is a God that wields the rod 

Above : by him alone 
The Greek shall be free, when the Mede shall flee 
In shame from Marathon. 

He comes ; and o'er the bright JEo-ean, 

Where his masted army came, 
The subject isles uplift the paean 

Of glory to his name. 
Strong Naxos, strong Ere'tria yield ; 

His captains near the shore 
Of Marathon's fair and fateful field, 
Where a tyrant marched before. 
And a traitor guide, the sea beside, 
Now marks the land for his own, 
Where the marshes red shall soon be the bed 
Of the Mede in Marathon. 

Who shall number the host of the Mede? 

Their high-tiered galleys ride, 
Like locust-bands with darkening speed, 

Across the groaning tide. 

10* 



226 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Who shall tell the many hoofed tramp 

That shakes the dusty plain ? 
Where the pride of his horse is the strength of his camp, 
Shall the Mede forget to gain ? 

O fair is the pride of the cohorts that ride, 

To the eye of the morning shown S 
But a god in the sky hath doomed them to lie 
In dust on Marathon. 

Dauntless, beside the sounding sea, 

The Athenian men reveal 
Their steady strength. That they are free 

They know ; and inly feel 
Their high election, on that day, 
In foremost fight to stand, 
And dash the enslaving yoke away 
From all the Grecian land. 

Their praise shall sound the world around, 

Who shook the Persian throne, 
When the shout of the free travelled over the sea 
From famous Marathon. 

From dark Citha/ron's sacred slope 

The small Plataean band 
Bring hearts that swell with patriot hope, 

To wield a common brand 
With Theseus' sons, at danger's gates, 

While spellbound Sparta stands, . 
And for the pale moon's changes waits 
With stiff and stolid hands; 

And hath no share in the glory rare, 
That Athens shall make her own, 
When the long-haired Mede with fearful speed 
Falls back from Marathon. 

" On, sons of the Greeks !" the war-cry rolls ; 
" The land that gave you birth, 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 227 

Yonr wives, and all the dearest souls 
That circle round each hearth ; 
The shrines upon a thousand hills, 

The memory of your sires, 
Nerve now with brass your resolute wills, 
And fan your valorous fires !" 

And on like a wave came the rush of the brave — 

" Ye sons of the Greeks, on, on !" 
And the Mede stepped back from the eager attack 
Of the Greek in Marathon. 

Hear'st thou the rattling of spears on the right? 

Seest thou the gleam in the sky ? 
The gods come to aid the Greeks in the fio-ht, 

And the favoring heroes are nio-h. 
The lion's hide I see in the sky, 

And the knotted club so fell, 
And kingly Theseus's conquering eye, 
And Maca'ria, nymph of the well. 1 
Purely, purely, the fount did flow, 

When the morn's first radiance shone ; 
But eve shall know the crimson flow 
Of its wave, by Marathon. 

On, son of Cimon, 2 bravely on ! 

And Aristides the just ! 
Your names have made the field your own, 

Your foes are in the dust ! 
The Lydian satrap spurs his steed, 

The Persian's bow is broken : 
His purple pales ; the vanquished Mede 

Beholds the angry token 



» The nymph Macavia, daughter of Hercules, was said to have a foun- 
tain on the field of Marathon. There is a well near the north end of the 
plain, where the fountain is supposed to have been. 

a Milti'ades, the general in command, whose father's name was Cimon. 



228 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Of thundering Jove, who rules above ; 

And the bubbling marshes moan ' 
With the trampled dead that have found their bed 

In gore, at Marathon. 

The ships have sailed from Marathon 

On swift disaster's wings ; 
And an evil dream hath fetched a groan 

From the heart of the king of kings. 
An eagle he saw, in the shades of night, 
With a dove that bloodily strove ; 
And the weak hath vanquished the strong in fight, 
The eagle hath fled from the dove. 2 

Great Jove, that reigns in the starry plains, 

To the heart of the king hath shown 
That the boastful parade of his pride was laid 
In dust at Marathon. 

But through Pentelicus' winding vales 

The hymn triumphal runs, 
And high-shrined Athens proudly hails 

Her free-returning sons. 
And Pallas, from her ancient rock, 3 i 

With her shield's refulgent round, 
Blazes ; her frequent worshippers flock, 
And high the pa3ans sound, 

How in deathless glory the famous story 

Shall on the winds be blown, 
That the long-haired Mede was driven with speed 
By the Greeks, from Marathon, 



1 There are two extensive marshes on the plain of Marathon, one at 
each extremity. The Persians were driven back into the marsh at the 
north end. 

2 Reference is here made to A-tos'sa's dream, as given by ^Eschylus 
in his tragedy of The Persians. See p. 250. 

3 Pallas, or Minerva. See p. 9; also pp. 71-74 for the founding of 
Athens, and for the supremacy of Minerva over the city. 



THE PEESIAN WAES. 229 

And Greece shall be a hallowed name, 

While the sun shall climb the pole, 
And Marathon fan strong freedom's flame 

In many a pilgrim soul. 
And o'er that mound where heroes sleep, 1 

By the waste and reedy shore, 
Full many a patriot eye shall weep, 
Till Time shall be no more. 

And the bard shall brim with a holier hymn, 

"When he stands by that mound alone, 
And feel no shrine on earth more divine 
Than the dust of Marathon. 

THE DEATH OF MILTIADES. 

Socm after the Persian defeat, Miltiades, who at first 
received all the honors that a grateful people could be- 
stow, met a fate that casts a melancholy gloom over his 
history, and that has often been cited in proof of the as- 
sertion that " republics are fickle and ungrateful." His- 
tory shows, however, that the Athenians were not greatly 
in the wrong in their treatment of Miltiades. He ob- 
tained of them the command of an expedition whose 
destination was known to himself alone ; assuring them 
of the honorableness and the success of the enterprise. 
But much treasure was spent, many lives were lost, and 
through the seeming treachery of Miltiades the expedi- 
tion terminated in disaster and disgrace. It was found, 
upon investigation, that the motive of the expedition 
was private resentment against a prominent citizen of 
Paros. Miltiades was therefore condemned to death ; 
but gratitude for his previous valuable services miti- 
gated the penalty to a fine of fifty talents. His death 
occurred soon after, from a wound that he received in a 
fall while at Paros, and the fine was paid by his son Cimon. 



This famous mound is still to be seen on the battle-field. 



230 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

As Grote well observes, " The fate of Miltiades, so 
far from illustrating either the fickleness or the ingrati- 
tude of his countrymen, attests their just appreciation 
of deserts. It also illustrates another moral of no small 
importance to the right comprehension of Grecian af- 
fairs; it teaches us the painful lesson how perfectly 
maddening were the effects of a copious draught of 
glory on the temperament of an enterprising and am- 
bitious Greek. There can be no doubt that the rapid 
transition, in the course of about one week, from Athe- 
nian terror before the battle to Athenian exultation 
after it, must have produced demonstrations toward 
Miltiades such as were never paid to any other man in 
the whole history of the commonwealth. Such unmeas- 
ured admiration unseated his rational judgment, so that 
his mind became abandoned to the reckless impulses of 
insolence, antipathy, and rapacity — that distempered 
state for which (according to Grecian morality) the re- 
tributive ^Nemesis was ever on the watch, and which, 
in his case, she visited with a judgment startling in its 
rapidity, as well as terrible in its amount." 1 

But, as Gillies remarks, " The glory of Miltiades sur- 
vived him. At the distance of half a century, when the 
battle of Marathon was painted by order of the state, 
it was ordered that the figure of Miltiades be placed in 
the foreground, animating the troops to victory — a re- 
ward which, during the virtuous simplicity of the an- 
cient commonwealth, conferred more real honor than 
all that magnificent profusion of crowns and statues 
which, in the later times of the republic, were rather 
extorted by general fees than bestowed by public ad- 
miration." 2 



1 " History of Greece," Chap, xxxvi. 

2 See Oration of ^Esehines, pp. 424-426. 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 231 



ARISTI'DES AND THEMIS' TOCLES. 

After the death of Miltiades, Themistocles and Aris- 
tides became the most prominent men among the Athe- 
nians. The former, a most able statesman, but influ- 
enced by ambitious motives, aimed to make Athens 
great and powerful that he himself might rise to greater 
eminence; while the latter was a pure patriot, wholly 
destitute of selfish ambition, and knew no cause but 
that of justice and the public welfare. The poet Thom- 
son thus characterizes him : 

Then Aristides lifts his honest front ; 

Spotless of heart, to whom the unflattering voice 

Of Freedom gave the name of Just. 

In pure majestic poverty revered ; 

Who, e'en his glory to his country's weal 

Submitting, swelled a haughty rival's fame. 

But the very integrity of Aristides made for him 
secret enemies, who, although they charged him with 
no crimes, were yet able to procure his banishment by 
the process of ostracism, in which his great rival, The- 
mistocles, took a leading part. This kind of condemna- 
tion was not inflicted as a punishment, but as a precau- 
tionary measure against a degree of personal popularity 
that might be deemed dangerous to the public welfare. 
The process was as follows: In an assembly of the peo- 
ple each man was at liberty to write on a shell the name 
of the person whom he wished to have banished, and if 
six thousand votes or more were recorded, that person 
against whom the greatest number of votes had been 
given was banished for ten years, but with leave to 
enjoy his estate, and return after that period. Plu- 
tarch relates the following incident connected with the 
banishment of xlristides : " An illiterate burgher com- 



232 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ing to Aristides, whom lie took for some ordinary per- 
son, and giving him his shell, desired him to write 
' Aristides' upon it. The good man, surprised at the 
adventure, asked him ' Whether Aristides had ever in- 
jured him V ' No,' said he, ' nor do I even know him ; 
but it vexes me to hear him everywhere called the Just.' 
Aristides made no answer, but took the shell, and, hav- 
ing written his own name upon it, returned it to the 
man. When he quitted Athens, he lifted up his hands 
toward heaven, and, agreeably to his character, made a 
prayer, very different from that of Achilles; namely, 
'that the people of Athens might never see the day 
which should force them to remember Aristides.'" 

But it was, perhaps, fortunate for the liberties of 
Greece that Themistocles, instead of Aristides, was left 
in full power at Athens. " The peculiar faculty of his 
mind," says Thirl wall, "which Thucydides contem- 
plated with admiration, was the quickness with which 
it seized every object that came in its way, perceived 
the course of action required by new situations and sud- 
den junctures, and penetrated into remote consequences. 
Such were the abilities which were most needed at this 
period for the service of Athens." Soon after the bat- 
tle of Marathon a war had broken out between Athens 
and .zEgina, which still continued, and which gave The- 
mistocles an opportunity to exercise his powers of ready 
invention and prompt execution. .zEgina was one of 
the wealthiest of the Grecian islands, and possessed the 
most powerful navy in all Greece. Themistocles soon 
saw that to successfully cope with this formidable rival, 
as well as rise to a higher rank among the Grecian 
states, Athens must become a great maritime power. 
He therefore obtained the consent of the Athenians to 
devote a large surplus then in the public treasury, but 
which belonged to individual citizens, to the building 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 233 

of a hundred galleys ; and, by this sacrifice of individual 
emolument to the general good, the Athenian navy was 
increased to two hundred ships. But the foresight of 
Themistocles extended still farther, and it was no less 
his design, in making Athens a first-class maritime 
power, to protect her against Persia, which, as he well 
knew, was preparing for another and still more formid- 
able attack on Greece. 



III. THE SECOND PERSIAN INVASION. 

For three years subsequent to the battle of Marathon 
Darius made great preparations for a second invasion of 
Greece, intending to lead his forces in person ; but death 
put an end to his plans. Xerxes, his son and successor, 
was urged by many advisers to carry out his father's in- 
tentions. His uncle Artaba'nus alone endeavored to di- 
vert him from the enterprise ; but Xerxes, having spent 
four years in collecting a large fleet and a vast body of 
troops from all quarters of his extensive dominions, set 
out from Sardis with great ostentation, in the spring of 
the year 480, to avenge the disgrace of Marathon. He- 
rodotus relates that, on reaching Aby'dos, on the Hel- 
lespont, Xerxes reviewed his vast host, and wept when 
he thought of the shortness of human life, and consid- 
ered that of all his immense host not one man would be 
alive when a hundred years had passed away. The his- 
torian's account is as follows : 

Xerxes at Abydos. 

" Arrived here, Xerxes wished to look upon his host ; 
so, as there was a throne of white marble upon a hill 
near the city, which they of Abydos had prepared before- 
hand, by the king's bidding, for his especial use, Xerxes 
took his seat on it, and, gazing thence upon the shore 



234 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

below, beheld at one view all his land forces and all his 
ships. * * * As he looked and saw the whole Hellespont 
covered with the vessels of his fleet, and all the shore 
and every plain about Abydos as full as could be of 
men, Xerxes congratulated himself on his good-fortune; 
but, after a little while, he wept. Then Artabanus, the 
king's uncle (the same who at the first so freely spake 
his mind to the king, and advised him not to lead his 
army against Greece), when he heard that Xerxes was in 
tears, went to him, and said : 

"'How different, sire, is what thou art now doing 
from what thou didst a little while ago ! Then thou 
didst congratulate thyself, and now, behold ! thou weep- 

est.' 

" ' There came upon me,' replied he, < a sudden pity 
when I thought of the shortness of man's life, and con- 
sidered that of all this host, so numerous as it is, not one 
will be alive when a hundred years are gone by.' 

" * And yet there are sadder things in life than that,' 
returned the other. ' Short as our time is, there is no 
man, whether it be here among this multitude or else- 
where, who is so happy as not to have felt the wish — I 
will not say once, but full many a time— that he were 
dead rather than alive. Calamities fall upon us, sick- 
nesses vex and harass us, and make life, short though it 
be, to appear long. So death, through the wretchedness 
of our life, is a most sweet refuge to our race ; and God, 
who gives us the tastes we enjoy of pleasant times, is 
seen, in his very gift, to be envious.' " 



5 V 

Trans, by Rawlinson. 



Much that is told about Xerxes— how he cut off 
Mount Athos from the main-land by a canal ; how he 
made a bridge of boats across the Hellespont, where it is 
three miles wide, and ordered the waters to be scourged 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 235 

because they destroyed the bridge ; how he constructed 
new bridges, over which his vast army crossed the Hel- 
lespont as along a royal road ; and how his army drank 
a whole river dry — all of which is gravely related by 
Herodotus as fact, is discredited by the Latin poet Juve- 
nal, who attributes these stories to the imaginations of 
" browsy poets." 

Old Greece a tale of Atlios would make out, 
Cut from the continent and sailed about ; 
Seas hid with navies, chariots passing o'er 
The channel on a bridge from shore to shore ; 
Rivers, whose depths no sharp beholder sees, 
Drunk, at an array's dinner, to the lees ; 
With a long legend of romantic things, 
Which, in his cups, the browsy poet sings. 

Tenth Satire. Trans, by Drtden. 

That Xerxes bridged the Hellespont, however, in the 
manner related by Herodotus, is an accepted fact of his- 
tory. As Milton says, 

Xerxes, the liberty of Greece to yoke, 
From Susa, his Memnonian palace high, 
Came to the sea, and over Hellespont 
Bridging his way, Europe with Asia joined. 

Paradise Regained. 

He crossed to Ses'tus, a city of Thrace, and entered 
Europe at the head of an army the greatest the world 
has ever seen, and whose numbers have been estimated 
at over two millions of fighting men. Having marched 
along the coast through Thrace and Macedonia, this im- 
mense force passed through Thessaly, and arrived, with- 
out opposition, at the Pass of Thermopylae, a narrow I 
defile on the western shore of the gulf that lies between 
Thessaly and Eubcea, and almost the only road by which 
Greece proper, or ancient Greece, could be entered on 



236 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the north-east by way of Thessaly. In the mean time 
the Greeks had not been idle. The winter before Xerxes 
left Asia a general congress of the Grecian states was 
held at the isthmus of Corinth, at which the differences 
between Athens and ^Egina were first settled, and then 
a vigorous effort was made by Athens and Sparta to 
unite the states and cities in one great league against 
the power of Persia. But, notwithstanding the common 
danger, only a few of the states responded to the call, 
and the only people north and east of the isthmus who 
joined the league were the Athenians, Phocians, Platse- 
ans, and Thespians. The command of both the land and 
naval forces was relinquished by Athens- to the Spar- 
tans ; and it was resolved to make the first stand against 
Persia at the Pass of Thermopylae. 

THE BATTLE OF THERMOPYLAE. 

When the Persian monarch reached Thermopylae, he 
found a body of but eight thousand men, commanded 
by the Spartan king Leonidas, prepared to dispute his 
passage. A herald was sent to the Greeks commanding 
them to lay down their arms ; but Leonidas replied, with 
true Spartan brevity, a Come and take them !" When 
it was remarked that the Persians were so numerous 
that their darts would darken the sun, "Then," replied 
Dien'eces, a Spartan, "we shall fight in the shade." 
Trained from youth to the endurance of all hardships, 
and forbidden by their laws ever to flee from an enemy, 
the sons of Sparta were indeed formidable antagonists 
for the Persians to encounter. 

Stern were her sons. Upon Euro'tas' bank, 

Where black Ta-yg'etus o'er cliff and peak 

Waves his dark pines, and spreads his glistening snows, 

On five low hills their city rose : no walls, 

No ramparts closed it round ; its battlements 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 237 

And towers of strength were men — high-minded men, 

Who heard the cry of danger with more joy 

Than softer natures listen to the voice 

Of pleasure ; who, with unremitting toil 

In chase, in battle, or athletic course, 

To fierceness steeled their native hardihood ; 

Who sunk in death as tranquil as in sleep, 

And, hemmed by hostile myriads, never turned 

To flight, but closer drew before their breasts 

The massy buckler, firmer fixed the foot, 

Bit the writhed lip, and, where they struggled, fell. 

Hatgarth. 

Xerxes, astonished that the Greeks did not disperse 
at the sight of his vast army, waited four days, and then 
ordered a body of his troops to attack them, and lead 
them captive before him; but the barbarians fell in 
heaps in the very presence of the king, and blocked the 
narrow pass with their dead. Xerxes now thought the 
contest worthy of the superior prowess of his own 
guards, the ten thousand Immortals. These were led 
up as to a certain victory ; but the Greeks stood their 
ground as before. The combat lasted a whole day, 
and the slaughter of the enemy was terrible. Another 
day of combat followed, with like results, and the con- 
fidence of the Persian monarch was changed into de- 
spondence and perplexity. 

While in the uncertainty caused by these repeated 
failures to force a passage, Xerxes learned, from a Greek 
traitor, of a secret path over the mountains, by which 
he was able to throw a force of twenty thousand men 
into the rear of the brave defenders of the pass. Leon- 
idas, seeing that his post was no longer tenable, now 
dismissed all his allies that desired to retire, and retained 
only three hundred fellow -Spartans, with some Thes- 
pians and Thebans— in all about one thousand men. 



238 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

He would have saved two of his kinsmen, by sending 
them with messages to Sparta ; but the one said he had 
come to bear arms, not to carry letters, and the other 
that his deeds would tell all that Sparta desired to 
know. Leonidas did not wait for an attack, but sally- 
ing forth from the pass, and falling suddenly upon the 
Persians, he penetrated to the very centre of their host, 
where the battle raged furiously, and two of the broth- 
ers of Xerxes were" slain. Then the surviving Greeks, 
with the exception of the Thebans, fell back within the 
pass and took their final stand upon a hillock, where 
they fought with the valor of desperation until every 
man was & slain. The Thebans, however, who from the 
first had been distrusted by Leonidas, threw down their 
arms early in the fight, and begged for quarter. 

The conflict itself, and the glory of the struggle on 
the part of the Spartans, have been favorite themes 
with the poets of succeeding ages. The following de- 
scription is by Haygaeth : 

Long and doubtful was the fight ; 
Day after day the hostile army poured 
Its choicest warriors, but in vain ; they fell, 
Or fled inglorious. Foul treachery 
At last prevailed ; a steep and dangerous path, 
Known only to the wandering mountaineers, 
By difficult ascent led to the rear 
Of the heroic Greeks. The morning dawned, 
And the brave chieftain, when he raised his head 
From the cold rock on which he rested, viewed 
Banner and helmet, and the waving fire 
From lance and buckler, glancing high amidst 
Each pointed cliff and copse which stretch along 
Yon mountain's bosom. Then he saw his fate ; 
But saw it with an unaverted eye: 
Around his spear he called his countrymen, 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 239 

And with a smile that o'er his rugged cheek 
Pass'd transient, like the momentary flash 
Streaking a thunder-cloud — " But we will die " 
(He cried) " like Grecians ; we will leave our sons 
A bright example. Let each warrior bind 
Firmly his mail, and grasp his lance, and scowl 
From underneath his helm a frown of death 
Upon his shrinking foe ; then let him fix 
His firm, unbending knee, and where he fights 
There fall." They heard, and, on their shields 
Clashing the war-sonq- with a noble ra<ie, 
Rushed headlong in the conflict of the fio-ht. 
And died, as they had lived, triumphantly. 

The Greek historian Diodorus, followed by the biog- 
rapher Plutarch and the Latin historian Justin, states 
that Leonidas made the attack on the Persian camp 
during the night, and in the darkness and in the con- 
fusion of the struggle nearly penetrated to the royal 
tent of Xerxes. On this basis of supposed facts the 
poet Croly wrote his stirring poem descriptive of the 
conflict ; but the statement of Diodorus, which is irrec- 
oncilable with Herodotus, is generally discredited by 
modern writers. 

Monuments to the memory of the Greeks who fell 
were erected on the battle-ground, and many were the 
epitaphs written to commemorate the heroism of the 
famous three hundred ; but the oldest, best, and most 
celebrated of these is the inscription that was placed 
on their altar-tomb, written by the poet Simon'ides, of 
Ce'os. It consists of only two lines in the original 
Greek. 1 All Greece for centuries had them by heart; 
but in the lapse of time she forgot them, and then, in 

1 The following is the original Greek of the epitaph : 

"O. ?eIV, uyfeWeiv Aa.Ke5a(fxovioi?, on Trjde 
Kei/neOa, to?9 Keivwv fjij/iaat 7re406fievo<. 



240 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the language of "Christopher North," "Greece was 
living Greece no more." There have been no less than 
three Latin and eighteen English versions of this epi- 
taph ; and herewith we give three of the latter : 

Go, stranger, and to Lac-e-dse'mon tell 
That here, obedient to her laws, we fell. 

Stranger, to Sparta say that here we rest 
In death, obedient to her high behest. 

Go, tell the Spartans, thou who passest by, 
That here, obedient to their laws, we lie, 

Another inscription, said to have been written by 
Simonides for the tombs of the heroes of Thermopylae, 
is as follows : 

Happy they, the chosen brave, 

Whom Destiny, whom Valor led 
To their consecrated grave 

'Mid Thessalia's mountains dread. 
Their sepulchre's a holy shrine, 
Their epitaph, the engraven line 
Recording former deeds divine ; 
And Pitv's melancholy wail 
Is changed to hymns of praise that load the evening gale. 

Entombed in noble deed's they're laid— 
Nor silent rust, nor Time's inexorable hour, 
Shall e'er have power 
To rend that shroud which veils their hallowed shade. 
Hellas mourns the dead 

Sunk in their narrow grave ; 
But thou, dark Sparta's chief, whose bosom bled 
First in the battle's wave, 
Bear witness that they fell as best beseems the brave. 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 241 

Leonidas himself fell in the plain, and his body was 
carried into the defile by his followers. He was buried 
at the north entrance to the pass, and over his grave 
was erected a mound, on which was placed the figure 
of a lion sculptured in stone. The sculptured lion 
marked the grave of the hero down to the time of 
Herodotus. 

On Phocis' shores the cavern's gloom 

Imbrowns yon solitary tomb : 

There, in the sad and silent grave 

Repose the ashes of the brave 

Who, when the Persian from afar 

On Hellas poured the stream of war, 

At Freedom's call, with martial pride, 

For his loved country fought and died. 

Seek'st thou the place where, 'midst the dead 

The hero of the battle bled ? 

Yon sculptured lion, frowning near, 

Points out Leonidas's bier. anon. 

The poet Bykon, who was peculiarly the friend of 
Greece, and an earnest admirer of both the genius and 
the heroic deeds of her sons, has written the following 
lines commemorating the glory of those who fell at 
Thermopylae : 

They fell devoted, but undying ; 
The very gale their names seemed sighing : 
The waters murmured of their name ; 
The woods were peopled with their fame ; 
The silent pillar, lone and gray, 
Claimed kindred with their sacred clay : 
Their spirits wrapped the dusky mountain, 
Their memory sparkled o'er the fountain ; 
The meanest rill, the mightiest river 
Rolled mingling with their fame forever. 

11 



242 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

THE ABANDONMENT OF ATHENS. 

While ' fighting was in progress at Thermopylae, a 
Greek fleet, under the command of the Spartan Eurybi'- 
ades, that had been sent to guard the Euboean Sea, en^ 
countered the Persian ships at Artemis'ium. In several 
engagements that occurred, the Athenian vessels, com- 
manded by Themistocles, were especially distinguished ; 
and although the contests with the enemy were not de- 
cisive, yet, says Pltttakch, " they were of great advan- 
tage to the Greeks, who learned by experience that nei- 
ther the number of ships, nor the beauty and splendor 
of their ornaments, nor the vaunting shouts and songs 
of the Persians, were anything dreadful to men who 
know how to fight hand-to-hand, and are determined to 
behave gallantly. These things they were taught to de- 
spise when they came to close action and grappled with 
the foe. Hence in this respect, and for this reason, Pin- 
dar's sentiments appear just, when he says of the fight 
at Artemisium, 

" ' 'Twas then that Athens the foundation laid 
Of Liberty's fair structure.' " 

Although the Greeks were virtually the victors in 
these engagements, at least one - half of their vessels 
were disabled; and, hearing of the defeat of Leonidas 
at Thermopylae,- they resolved to retreat. Having sailed 
through the Euboean Sea, the fleet kept on its way until 
it reached the Island of Salamis, in the Saron'ic Gulf. 
Here Themistocles learned that no friendly force was 
guarding the frontier of Attica, although the Pelopon- 
nesian states had promised to send an army into Bceo- 
tia ; and he saw that there was nothing to prevent the 
Persians from marching on Athens. He therefore ad- 
vised the Athenians to abandon the city to the mercy 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 243 

of the Persians, and commit their safety and their hopes 
of victory to the navy. The advice was adopted, 
though not without a hard struggle; and those of the 
inhabitants who were able to bear arms retired to the 
Island of Salami's, while the old and infirm, the women 
and children, found shelter in a city of Argolis. 

THE BATTLE OF SAL AMIS. 

Xerxes pursued his march through Greece unopposed 
except by Thespise and Platsea, which towns he re- 
duced, and spread desolation over Attica until he ar- 
rived at the foot of the Cecropian hill, which he found 
guarded by a handful of desperate citizens who refused 
to surrender. But the brave defenders were soon put to 
the sword, and Athens was plundered and then burned 
to the ground. About this time the Persian fleet ar- 
rived in the Bay of Phale'rum, and Xerxes immediately 
despatched it to bloek up that of the Greeks in the nar- 
row strait of Salamis. Enrybiades, the Spartan, who 
still commanded the Grecian fleet, was urged by The- 
mistocles, and also by Aristides, who had been recalled 
from exile, to hazard an engagement at once in the nar- 
row strait, where the superior numbers of the Persians 
would be of little avail. The Peloponnesian command- 
ers, however, wished to move the fleet to the Isthmus of 
Corinth, where it would have the aid of the land forces. 
At last the counsel of Themistocles prevailed, and the 
Greeks made the attack. The engagement was a cour- 
ageous and persistent one on both sides, but the Greeks 
came off victorious. Xerxes had caused a royal throne 
to be erected on one of the neighboring heights, where, 
surrounded by his army, he might witness the naval 
conflict in which he was so confident of victory. But 
he had the misfortune to see his magnificent navy 
almost utterly annihilated. Among the slain was the 



244 MOSAICS OF GKECIAN HISTOKY. 

brother of Xerxes, who commanded the navy, and many 
other Persians of the highest rank. 

A king sate on the rocky brow 

Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis ; 

And ships, by thousands, lay below, 
And men in nations — all were his ! 

He counted them at break of day — 

And when the sun set, where were they ? 

Byron. 

Anxious now for his own personal safety, the Persian 
monarch's whole care centred on securing his retreat 
by land. He passed rapidly into Thessaly, and, after a 
march of forty-five days, reached the shores of the Hel- 
lespont to find his bridges washed away. 

But how returned he ? say ; this soul of fire, 
This proud barbarian, whose impatient ire 
Chastised the winds that disobeyed his nod 
With stripes ne'er suffered by the JEolian god- 
But how returned he ? say ; his navy lost, 
In a small bark he fled the hostile coast, 
And, urged by terror, drove his laboring prore 
Through floating carcasses and fields of gore. 
So Xerxes sped ; so sped the conquering race : 
They catch at glory, and they clasp disgrace. 

Juvenal, Satire X. Trans, by Gifford. 

The ignominious retreat of Xerxes was in marked con- 
trast to the pomp and magnificence of his advance into 
Greece. Death from famine and distress spread its rav- 
ages among his troops, and the remnant that returned 
with him to Asia was but " a wreck, or fragment, rather 
than a part of his huge host." 

O'er Hellespont and Athos' marble head, 

More than a god he came, less than a man he fled. 

Luigi Alamanni. Trans, by Aubrey de Vere. 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 245 

A Celebrated Description of the Battle. 

Among the Athenians who nobly fought at Mara- 
thon, and who also took part in the battle of Salamis, 
was the tragedian iEschylus; and so much did he dis- 
tinguish himself in the capacity of soldier, that, in the 
picture which the Athenians caused to be painted rep- 
resenting the former battle, the figure of iEschylus held 
so prominent a place as to be at once recognized, even 
by a casual observer. Eight years after the latter bat- 
tie ^Eschylus composed his tragedy of The Persians, 
which portrays, in vivid colors, the defeat of Xerxes, 
and gives a fuller, and, indeed, better account of that 
memorable sea-fight than is found even in the pages of 
Herodotus. 

Says Mitfoed, " It is matter of regret, not indeed that 
iEschylus was a poet, but that prose-writing was yet in 
his age so little common that his poetical sketch of this 
great transaction is the most authoritative, the clearest, 
and the most consistent of any that has passed to pos- 
terity." In the famous tragedy of ^Eschylus the account 
of the destruction of the Persian fleet is supposed to be 
given by a Persian messenger, escaped from the fight, 
to Atos'sa, the mother of Xerxes. The scene is laid 
at Susa, the Persian capital, near the tomb of Darius. 
The whole drama may be considered as a proud trium- 
phal song in favor of Liberty. 

Atossa, appearing with her attendants, and anxious 
for news of her son, first inquires in what clime are the 
towers of Athens — the conquest of which her son had 
willed — and what mighty armies, what arms, and what 
treasures the Athenians boast, and what mighty mon- 
arch rules over them ; and is told, to her surprise, that 
instead of the strong bow, like the Persians, they have 
stout spears and massy bucklers ; and although their rich 



246 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

earth is a copious fount of silver, yet the people, " slaves 
to no lord, own no kingly power." Then enters the 
messenger, who exclaims : 

Woe to the towns of Asia's peopled realms ! 
Woe to the land of Persia, once the port 
Of boundless wealth ! All, at a blow, has perished ! 
Ah me ! How sad his task who brings ill tidings ! 
But, to my tale of woe— I needs must tell it. 
Persians — the whole barbaric host has fallen ! 

At this astounding news the chorus breaks out in 
concert : 

Oh horror, horror, what a train of ills ! 

Alas ! Is Hellas then unscathed ? And has 

Our arrowy tempest spent its force in vain? 

Raise the funereal cry— with dismal notes 

Wailing the wretched Persians. Oh, how ill 

They planned their measures ! All their army perished ! 

Then the messenger exclaims : 

I speak not from report ; but these mine eyes 

Beheld the ruin which my tongue would uiter. 

In heaps the unhappy dead lie on the strand 

Of Salamis, and all the neighboring shores. 

Oh, Salamis— how hateful is thy name ! 

Oh, how my heart groans but to think of Athens ! 

Atossa at length finds words to say : 

Astonished with these ills, my voice thus long 
Hath wanted utterance: griefs like these exceed 
The power of speech or question : yet e'en such, 
Inflicted by the gods, must mortal man, 
Constrained by loud necessity endure. 
But tell me all : without distraction, tell me 
All this calamity, though many a groan 
. Burst from thy laboring heart.. Who is not fallen ! 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 247, 

What leader must we wail ? "What sceptred chief, 
Dying, hath left his troops without a lord? 

The messenger tells her that Xerxes himself lives, 
and still beholds the light, and then gives her a general 
summary of the disasters that befell the Persians, the 
names of the chiefs that were slain, the numbers of the 
horsemen, and the spearmen, and the seamen that lay 
" slaughtered on the rocks," " buried in the waters," or 
" mouldering on the dreary shore." At the request of 
Atossa he then proceeds to give the following more de- 
tailed account, which, as we have said, is the best history 
that we have of this memorable naval conflict : 

Our evil genius, lady, or some god 

Hostile to Persia, led to every ill. 

Forth from the troops of Athens came a Greek, 

And thus addressed thy son, the imperial Xerxes: 

" Soon as the shades of night descend, the Grecians 

Shall quit their station : rushing to their oars, 

They mean to separate, and in secret flight 

Seek safety." At these words the royal chief, 

Little dreaming of the wiles of Greece, 

And gods averse, to all the naval leaders 

Gave his high charge : " Soon as yon sun shall cease 

To dart his radiant beams, and dark'ning night 

Ascends the temple of the sky, arrange • 

In three divisions your well-ordered ships, 

And guard each pass, each outlet of the seas : 

Others enring around this rocky isle 

Of Salamis. Should Greece escape her fate, 

And work her way by secret flight, your heads 

Shall answer the neglect." This harsh command 

He gave, exulting in his mind, nor knew 

W x hat Fate designed. W T ith martial discipline 

And prompt obedience, snatching a repast, 

Each mariner fixed well his ready oar. 



248 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Soon as the golden sun was set, and night 

Advanced, each, trained to ply the dashing oar, 

Assumed his seat ; in arms each warrior stood, 

Troop cheering troop through all the ships of war. 

Each to the appointed station steers his course, 

And through the night his naval force each chief 

Fix'd to secure the passes. Night advanced, 

But not by secret flight did Greece attempt 

To escape. The morn, all beauteous to behold, 

Drawn by white steeds, bounds o'er the enlighten'd earth 

At once from every Greek, with glad acclaim, 

Burst forth the song of war, whose lofty notes 

The echo of the island rocks returned, 

Spreading dismay through Persia's host, thus fallen 

From their high hopes ; no flight this solemn strain 

Portended, but deliberate valor bent 

On daring battle ; while the trumpet's sound 

Kindled the flames of war. But when their oars 

(The psean ended) with impetuous force 

Dash'd the surrounding surges, instant all 

Rush'd on in view ; in orderly array 

The squadron of the right first led, behind 

Rode their whole fleet; and now distinct was heard 

From every part this voice of exhortation : 

"Advance, ye sons of Greece, from thraldom save 
Your country — save your wives, your children save, 
The temples of your gods, the sacred tomb 
Where rest your honor'd ancestors ; this day 
The common cause of all demands your valor." 
Meantime from Persia's hosts the deep'ning shout 
Answer'd their shout ; no time for cold delay ; 
But ship 'gainst ship its brazen beak impell'd. 

First to the charge a Grecian galley rush'd ; 
111 the Phoenician bore the rough attack — 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 249 

Its sculptured prow all shatter'd. Each advanced, 

Daring an opposite. The deep array 

Of Persia at the first sustain'd the encounter ; 

But their throng' d numbers, in the narrow seas 

Confined, want room for action ; and deprived 

Of mutual aid, beaks clash with beaks, and each. 

Breaks all the other's oars : with skill disposed, 

The Grecian navy circled them around 

In fierce assault ; and, rushing from its height, 

The inverted vessel sinks. 

The sea no more 
Wears its accustomed aspect, with foul wrecks 
And blood disfigured ; floating carcasses 
Roll on the rocky shores ; the poor remains 
Of the barbaric armament to flight 
Ply every oar inglorious : onward rush 
The Greeks amid the ruins of the fleet, 
As through a shoal of fish caught in the net, 
Spreading destruction ; the wide ocean o'er 
Waitings are heard, and loud laments, till night, 
With darkness on her brow, brought grateful truce. 
Should I recount each circumstance of woe, 
Ten times on my unfinished tale the sun 
Would set ; for be assured that not one day 
Could close the ruin of so vast a host. 

After some farther account, by the messenger, of the 
magnitude of the ruin that had overwhelmed the Per- 
sian host, the mother of Xerxes thus apostrophizes and 
laments that "invidious fortune" which had pulled 
down this ruin on her son's devoted head : 

Invidious fortune, how thy baleful power 
Hath sunk the hopes of Persia ! Bitter fruit 
My son hath tasted from his purposed vengeance 
On Athens, famed for arms ; the fatal field 
Of Marathon, red with barbaric blood, 

11* 



250 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

.Bufficed not : that defeat he thought to avenge, 
And pulled this hideous ruin on his head ! 

Ah rue ! what sorrows for our ruined host 
Oppress my soul I Ye visions of the night, 
Haunting my dreams, how plainly did you show ; 
These ills ! You set them in too fair a light 

In the Epode, or closing portion of the tragedy, the 
following "Lament" may be considered as expressing 
the feelings with which the Persians bewailed this de- 
feat, with reference to its effects upon Persian authority 
over the Asiatic nations: 

With sacred awe 

The Persian law 

No more shall Asia's realm revere : 

To their lord's hand, 

At his command, 

No more the exacted tribute bear. 

Who now falls prostrate at the monarch's throne ? 

His regal greatness is no more. 

Now no restraint the wanton tongue shall own, 

Free from the golden curb of power; 

For on the rocks, washed by the beating flood, 

His awe-commanding nobles lie in blood. 

Potter's trans. 

Among the modern poems on Xerxes and the battle 
of Salamis, is one by the Scotch poet and translator, 
John Stuart Blackie, from wbich we take the follow- 
ing extracts : 

Seest thou where, sublimely seated on a silver-footed throne, 

With a high tiara crested, belted with a jewelled zone, 

Sits the king of kings, and, looking from the rocky mountain- 

side, 
Scans, with masted armies studded far, the fair Saronic tide? 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 251 

Looks lie not with high hope beaming? looks he not with pride 

elate? 
Seems he not a god ? The words he speaks are big with instant 

fate. 

He hath come from far Euphrates, and from Tigris' , rushing 

tide, 
To subdue the strength of Athens, to chastise the Spartan's 

pride ; 
He hath come with countless armies, gathered slowly from 

afar, 
From the plain, and from the mountain, marshalled ranks of 

motley war; 
From the land and from the ocean, that the burdened billows 

groan, 
That the air is black with banners, which great Xerxes calls his 

own. 

Soothly he hath nobly ridden o'er the fair fields, o'er the waste, 
As the earth might bear the burden, with a weighty -footed 

haste; 
He hath cut in twain the mountain, he hath bridged the rolling 

main, 
He hath lashed the flood of Hel'le, bound the billow with a 

chain ; 
And the rivers shrink before him, and the sheeted lakes are dry, 
From his burden-bearing oxen, and his hordes of cavalry ; 
And the gates of Greece stand open ; Ossa and Olympus fail ; 
And the mountain-girt ^mo'nia spreads the river and the gale. 

Stood nor man nor god before him ; he hath scoured the Attic 

land, 
Chased the valiant sons of Athens to a barren island's strand ; 
He hath hedged them round with triremes, lines on lines of 

bristling war; 
He hath doomed the prey for capture; he hath spread his 

meshes far ; 



252 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

And he sits sublimely seated on a throne with pride elate, 
To behold the victim fall beneath the sudden swooping Fate. 

Then follows an account of the nations which formed 
the Persian hosts, their arrangement to entrap the 
Greeks, who were thought to be meditating flight, the 
patriotic enthusiasm of the latter, the naval battle which 
followed, and the disastrous defeat of the Persians, the 
poem closing with the following satirical address to 
Xerxes : 

Wake thee ! wake thee ! blinded Xerxes ! God hath found thee 

out at last ; 
Snaps thy pride beneath his judgment, as the tree before the 

blast. 
Haste thee! haste thee! speed thy couriers— Persian couriers 

travel lightly — 
To declare thy stranded navy, that by cruel death unsightly 
Dimmed thy glory. Hie thee ! hie thee ! hence, even by what 

way thou earnest, 
Dwarfed to whoso saw thee mightiest, and where thou wert 

fiercest, tamest ! 

Frost and fire shall league together, angry heaven to earth 

respond, 
Strong Poseidon with his trident break thy impious-vaunted 

bond ; 
Where thou passed, with mouths uncounted, eating up the 

famished land, 
With few men a boat shall ferry Xerxes to the Asian strand. 
Haste thee! haste thee! they are waiting by the palace gates 

for thee ; 
By the golden gates of Susa eager mourners wait for thee. 
Haste thee! where the guardian elders wait, a hoary-bearded 

train ; 
They shall see their king, but never sec the sons they loved, 



again. 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 253 

Where thy weeping mother waits thee, Queen Atossa waits to 

see 
Dire fulfilment of her troublous, vision-haunted sleep in thee. 
She hath dreamt, and she shall see it, how an eagle, cowed with 

awe, 
Gave his kingly crest to pluck before a puny falcon's claw. 
Haste thee ! where the mighty shade of great Darius through 

the gloom 
Rises dread, to teach thee wisdom, couldst thou learn it, from 

the tomb. 
There begin the sad rehearsal, and, while streaming tears are 

shed, 

To the thousand tongues that ask thee, tell the myriads of thy 
dead ! 

THE BATTLE OF PLATTE' A. 

When Xerxes returned to his own dominions he left 
his general, Mardo'nius, with three hundred thousand 
men, to complete, if possible, the conquest of .Greece. 
Mardonius passed the winter in Thessaly, but in the 
following summer his army was totally defeated, and 
himself slain, in the battle of Platsea. Two hundred 
thousand Persians fell here, and only a small remnant 
escaped across the Hellespont. We extract from Bul- 
w t er's Athens the following eloquent description of this 
battle, both for the sake of its beauty and to show the 
effect of the religion of the Greeks upon the military 
character of the people. Mardonius had advanced to 
the neighborhood of Plataea, when he encountered that 
part of the Grecian army composed mostly of Spartans 
and Lacedaemonians, commanded by Pausa'nias, and 
numbering about fifty thousand men. The Athenians 
had previously fallen back to a more secure position, 
where the entire army had been ordered to concentrate ; 
and Pausanias had but just commenced the retrograde 
movement when the Persians made their appearance. 



254 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Bulwer says : "As the troops of Mardonius advanced, 
the rest of the Persian armament, deeming the task was 
now not to fight but to pursue, raised their standards 
and poured forward tumultuously, without discipline or 
order. Pausanias, pressed by the Persian line, lost no 
timein sending to the Athenians for succor. But when 
the latter were on their march with the required aid, 
they were suddenly intercepted by the Greeks in the 
Persian service, and cut off from the rescue of the Spar- 
tans. 

"The Spartans beheld themselves thus unsupported 
with considerable alarm. Committing himself to the 
gods, Pausanias ordained a solemn sacrifice, his whole 
army awaiting the result, while the shafts of the Per- 
sians poured on them near and fast. But the entrails 
presented discouraging omens, and the sacrifice was 
again renewed. Meanwhile the Spartans evinced their 
characteristic fortitude and discipline — not one man 
stirring from the ranks until the auguries should assume 
a more favoring aspect; all harassed, and some wounded 
by the Persian arrows, they yet, seeking protection only 
beneath their broad bucklers, waited with a stern pa- 
tience the time of their leader and of Heaven. Then 
fell Callic'rates, the stateliest and strongest soldier in 
the whole army, lamenting not death, but that his sword 
was as yet undrawn against the invader. 

"And still sacrifice after sacrifice seemed to forbid 
the battle, when Pausanias, lifting his eyes, that streamed 
with tears, to the Temple of Juno, that stood hard by, 
supplicated the goddess that, if the fates forbade the 
Greeks to conquer, they might at least fall like warri- 
ors; and, while uttering this prayer, the tokens waited 
for became suddenly visible in the victims, and the au- 
gurs announced the promise of coming victory. There- 
with the order of battle ran instantly through the army, 



THE PEESIAN WARS. 255 

and, to use the poetical comparison of Plutarch, the 
Spartan phalanx suddenly stood forth in its strength 
like some fierce animal, erecting its bristles, and prepar- 
ing its vengeance for the foe. The ground, broken into 
many steep and precipitous ridges, and intersected by 
the Aso'pus, whose sluggish stream winds over a broad 
and rushy bed, was unfavorable to the movements of 
cavalry, and the Persian foot advanced therefore on the 
Greeks. 

" Drawn up in their massive phalanx, the Lacedaemo- 
nians presented an almost impenetrable body — sweeping 
slowly on, compact and serried — while the hot and un- 
disciplined valor of the Persians, more fortunate in the 
skirmish than the battle, broke itself in a thousand waves- 
upon that moving rock. Pouring on in small numbers 
at a time, they fell fast round the progress of the Greeks 
— their armor slight against the strong pikes of Sparta — 
their courage without skill, their numbers without dis- 
cipline; still they fought gallantly, even when on the 
ground seizing the pikes with their naked hands, and, 
with the wonderful agility that still characterizes the 
Oriental swordsmen, springing to their feet and regain- 
ing their arms when seemingly overcome, wresting away 
their enemies' shields, and grappling with them desper- 
ately hand to hand. 

" Foremost of a band of a thousand chosen Persians, 
conspicuous by his white charger, and still more by his 
daring valor, rode Mardonius, directing the attack- 
fiercer wherever his armor blazed. Inspired -by his 
presence the Persians fought worthily of their warlike 
fame, and, even in falling, thinned the Spartan ranks. 
At length the rash but gallant leader of the Asiatic 
armies received a mortal wound— his skull was crushed 
in by a stone from the hand of a Spartan. His chosen 
band, the boast of the army, fell fighting around him, 



256 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

but his death was the general signal of defeat and flight. 
Encumbered by their long robes, and pressed by the re- 
lentless conquerors, the Persians fled in disorder toward 
their camp, which was secured by wooden intrenchments, 
by gates, and towers, and walls. Here, fortifying them- 
selves as they best might, they contended successfully, 
and with advantage, against the Lacedsemonians, who 
were ill skilled in assault and siege. 

" Meanwhile the Athenians gained the victory on the 
plains over the Greek allies of Mardonius, and now 
joined the Spartans at the camp. The Athenians are 
said to have been better skilled in the art of siege than 
the Spartans; yet at that time their experience could 
scarcely have been greater. The Athenians were at all 
times, however, of a more impetuous temper ; and the 
men who had ' run to the charge ? at Marathon were not 
to be baffled by the desperate remnant of their ancient 
foe. They scaled the walls; they effected a breach 
through which the Tege'ans were the first to rush ; the 
Greeks poured fast and fierce into the camp. Appalled, 
dismayed, stupefied by the suddenness and greatness of 
their loss, the Persians no longer sustained their fame ; 
they dispersed in all directions, falling, as they fled, with 
a prodigious slaughter, so that out of that mighty arma- 
ment scarce three thousand effected an escape." 

But the final overthrow of the Persian hosts on the 
battle-field of Plateea has an importance far greater than 
that of the deliverance of the Greeks from immediate 
danger. Perhaps no other event in ancient history has 
been so momentous in its consequences ; for what would 
have been the condition of Greece had she then become 
a province of the Persian empire % The greatness which 
she subsequently attained, and the glory and renown 
with which she has filled the earth, would never have 
had an existence. Little Greece sat at the gates of a 



THE PERSIAN WARS. 257 

continent, and denied an entrance to the gorgeous bar- 
barism of Asia. She determined that Europe should 
not be Asiatic ; that civilization should not sink into the 
abyss of unmitigated despotism. She turned the tide 
of Persian encroachment back across the Hellespont, 
and Alexander only followed the refluent wave to the 
Indus. 

"'Twas then," as Southey says, 

" The fate 
Of unborn ages hung upon the fray : 
'Twas at Plata3a, in that awful hour 
When Greece united smote the Persian's power. 
For, had the Persian triumphed, then the spring 

Of knowledge from that living source had ceased ; 
All would have fallen before the barbarous king — 

Art, Science, Freedom : the despotic East, 
Setting her mark upon the race subdued, 
Had stamped them in the mould of sensual servitude." 

Furthermore, on this subject we subjoin the follow- 
ing reflections from the author previously quoted : 

" When the deluge of the Persian arms rolled back to 
its Eastern bed, and the world was once more compara- 
tively at rest, the continent of Greece rose visibly and 
majestically above the rest of the civilized earth. Afar 
in the Latian plains the infant state of Eome was si- 
lently and obscurely struggling into strength against 
the neighboring and petty states in which the old Etru- 
rian civilization was rapidly passing into decay. The 
genius of Gaul and Germany, yet unredeemed from 
barbarism, lay scarce known, save where colonized by 
Greeks, in the gloom of its woods and wastes. 

" The ambition of Persia, still the great monarchy of 
the world, was permanently checked and crippled; the 
strength of generations had been wasted, and the im- 



258 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

merise extent of the empire only served yet more to sus- 
tain the general peace, from the exhaustion of its forces. 
The defeat of Xerxes paralyzed the East. Thus Greece 
was left secure, and at liberty to enjoy the tranquillity 
it had acquired, and to direct to the arts of. peace the 
novel and amazing energies which had beeir prompted 
by the dangers and exalted by the victories of war," 

On the very day of the battle of Plataea the remains 
of the Persian fleet which had escaped at Salamis, and 
which had been drawn up on shore at Myc'a-le, on the 
coast of Ionia, were burned by the Grecians ; and Ti- 
gra'nes, the Persian commander of the land forces, and 
forty thousand of his men, were slain. This was the 
first signal blow struck by the Greek at the power of 
Persia on the continent. "Lingering at Sardis," says 
Bttlwer, "Xerxes beheld the scanty and exhausted 
remnants of his mighty force, the fugitives of the fa- 
tal days of Mycale and Platsea, The army over which 
he had wept in the zenith of his power had fulfilled 
the prediction of his tears ; and the armed might of 
Media and Egypt, of Lydia and Assyria, was now no 

more!" , 

In one of the comedies of the Greek poet Aeistoph - 
anes, entitled The Wasps, which is designed principally 
to satirize the passion of the Athenians for the excite- 
ment of the law courts, there occurs the following epi- 
sode, that has for its basis the activity of the Athenians 
at the battle of Platsea. We learn from this episode 
that the appellation, the "Attic "Wasp," had its origin 
in the venomous persistence with which the Athenians, 
swarming like wasps, stung the Persians in their retreat, 
after the defeat of Mardonius. Occurring in a popular 
satirical comedy, it also shows how readily any allusion 
to the famous 'victories of Greece could be made to do 
service on popular occasions— an allusion that the dram- 



THE PERSIAN WARS. , 259 

atist knew would awaken in the popular heart great ad- 
miration for him and his work : 

With torch and brand the Persian horde swept on from east to 

west, 
To storm the hives that we had stored, and smoke us from our 

nest ; 
Then we laid our hand to spear and targe, and met him on his 

path; 
Shoulder to shoulder, close we stood, and bit our lips for wrath. 
So fast and thick the arrows flew, that none might see the 

heaven, 
But the gods were on our side that day, and we bore them back 

at even. 
High o'er our heads, an omen good, we saw the owlet wheel, 
And the Persian trousers in their backs felt the good Attic 

steel. 
Still as the) T fled we followed close, a swarm of vengeful foes. 
And stung them where we chanced to light, on cheek, and lip, 

and nose. 
So to this day, barbarians say, when whispered far or near, 
More than all else the Attic Wasp is still a name of fear. 

Trans, by W. Lucas Collins. 



260 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTER X. 

THE RISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 
I. THE DISGRACE AND DEATH OF THEMISTOCLES. 

Six years after the battle of Platsea the career of 
Xerxes was terminated by assassination, and his son, 
Artaxerxes Longim'anus, succeeded to the throne. ^ In 
the mean time Athens had been rebuilt and fortified 
by Themistocles, and the Piraeus (the port of Athens) 
enclosed within a wall as large in extent as that of Ath- 
ens, but of greater height and thickness. But Themis- 
tocles, by his selfish and arbitrary use of power, pro- 
voked the enmity of a large body of his countrymen ; 
and although he was acquitted of the charge of trea- 
sonable inclinations toward Persia, popular feeling soon 
after became so strong against him that he was con- 
demned to exile by the same process of ostracism that 
he had directed against Aristides, and he retired to Ar- 
gos (471 b.c.) Some time before this a Grecian force, 
composed of Athenians under Aristides, and Cimon the 
son of Miltiades, and Spartans under Pausanias the vic- 
tor of Platsea, waged a successful war upon the Persian 
dependencies of the ^Egean, and the coasts of Asia Mi- 
nor. The Ionian cities were aided in a successful re- 
volt, and Cyprus and Byzantium— the latter now Con- 
stantinople—fell into the hands of the Grecians. Pau- 
sanias, who was at the head of the whole armament, now 
began to show signs of treasonable conduct, which was 
more fully unfolded by a communication that he ad- 
dressed to the Persian court, seeking the daughter of 



KISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 261 

Xerxes in marriage, and promising to bring Sparta and 
the whole of Greece under Persian dominion. 

When news of the treason of Pausanias reached 
Sparta, he was immediately recalled, and, though no 
definite proof was at first furnished against him, his 
guilt was subsequently established, and he perished from 
starvation in the Temple of Minerva, whither he had fled 
for refuge, and where he was immured by the eph/ors. 
The fate of Pausanias involved that of Themistocles. 
In searching for farther traces of the former's plot some 
correspondence was discovered that furnished sufficient 
evidence of the complicity of Themistocles in the crime, 
and he was immediately accused by the Spartans, who 
insisted upon his being punished. The Athenians sent 
ambassadors to arrest him and bring him to Athens; 
but Themistocles fled from Argos, and finally sought 
refuge at the court of Persia. He died at Magnesia, 
in Asia Minor, which had been appointed his place of 
residence by Artaxerxes, and a splendid monument was 
raised to his memory; but in the time of the Eoman 
empire a tomb was pointed out by the sea-side, within 
the port of Piraeus, which was generally believed to con- 
tain his remains, and of which the comic poet Plato 
thus wrote : 

By the sea's margin, on the watery strand, 
Thy monument, Themistocles, shall stand. 
By this directed to thy native shore, 
The merchant shall convey his freighted store ; 
And when our fleets are summoned to the fi>ht 
Athens shall conquer with thy tomb in sight. 

Trans, by Cumberland. 

Although " the genius of Themistocles did not secure 
him from the seductions of avarice and pride, which led 
him to sacrifice both his honor and his country for the 



262 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

tinsel of Eastern pomp," yet, as Thielwall says, " No 
Greek had then rendered services such as those of 
Themistocles to the common country; and no Athe- 
nian, except Solon, had conferred equal benefits on Ath- 
ens. He had first delivered her from the most immi- 
nent danger, and then raised her to the pre-eminence on 
which she now stood. He might claim her greatness, 
and even her being, as his work." The following trib- 
ute to his memory is from the pen of Tullius Gem'- 
inus, a Latin poet : 

Greece be thy monument ; around her throw 

The broken trophies of the Persian fleet ; 
Inscribe the gods that led the insulting foe, 

And mighty Xerxes, at the tablet's feet. 
There lay Themistocles ; to spread his fame 

A lasting column Salamis shall be ; 
Raise not, weak man, to that immortal name 

The little records of mortality. Trans, by Merivale. 



II. THE RISE AND FALL OF CIMON. 

Foremost among the rivals of Themistocles in ability 
and influence, was Cimon, the son of Miltiades. In his 
youth he was inordinately fond of pleasure, and revealed 
none of those characteristics for which he subsequently 
became distinguished. But his friends encouraged him 
to follow in his father's footsteps, and Aristides soon 
discovered in him a capacity and disposition that he 
could use to advantage in his own antagonism to The- 
mistocles. To Aristides, therefore, Cimon was largely 
indebted for his influence and success, as well as for his 
mild temper and gentle manners. 

Reared by his care, of softer ray appears 

Cimon, sweet-souled ; whose genius, rising strong, 



RISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 263 

Shook off the load of young debauch ; abroad 

The scourge of Persian pride, at home the friend 

Of every worth and every splendid art ; 

Modest and simple in the pomp of wealth. Thomson. 

On the banishment of Themistocles Aristides became 
the undisputed leader of the aristocratical party at Ath- 
ens, and on his death, four years subsequently, Cimon 
succeeded him. The latter was already distinguished for 
his military successes, and was undoubtedly the greatest 
commander of his time. He continued the successful 
war against Persia for many years, and among his nota- 
ble victories was one obtained on both sea and land, in 
PamphyPia, in Asia Minor, and called 

THE BATTLE OF EURYMEDOX. 

After dispersing a fleet of two hundred ships Cimon 
landed his troops, .flushed with victory, and completely 
routed a large Persian army. The poet Simonides 
praises this double victory in the following verse : 

Ne'er since that olden time, when Asia stood 
First torn from Europe by the ocean flood, 
Since horrid Mars first poured on either shore 
The storm of battle and its wild uproar, 
Hath man by land and sea such glory won 
As by the mighty deed this day was done. 
By land, the Medes in myriads press the ground ; 
By sea, a hundred Tyrian ships are drowned, 
With all their martial host ; while Asia stands 
Deep groaning by, and wrings her helpless hands. 

Trans, by Meeivale. 

The same poet pays the following tribute to the Greeks 
who fell in this conflict : 

These^ by the streams of famed Eurymedon, 
There, envied youth's short brilliant race have run : 



264 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

In swift-winged ships, and on the embattled field, 

Alike they forced the Median bows to yield, 

Breaking their foremost ranks. Now here they lie, . 

Their names inscribed on rolls of victory. 

Trans. ~by Merivale. 

On the recall of Pansanias from Asia Minor Sparta 
lost, and Athens acquired, the command in the war 
against Persia. Athens was now rapidly approaching 
the summit of her military renown. The war with Per- 
sia did not prevent her from extending her possessions 
in Greece by force of arms ; and island after island of 
the iEgean yielded to her sway, while her colonies peo- 
pled the winding shores of Thrace and Macedon. The 
other states and cities of Greece could not behold her 
rapid, and apparently permanent, growth in power with- 
out great dissatisfaction and anxiety. When the Per- 
sian war was at its height, a sense of common danger 
had caused many of them to seek an alliance with Ath- 
ens, the result of what is known as the Confederacy of 
Delos ; but, now that the danger was virtually passed, 
long existing jealousies broke out, which led to political 
dissensions, and, finally, to the civil wars that caused the 
ruin of the Grecian republics. Sparta, especially, had 
long viewed with indignation the growing resources of 
Athens, and was preparing to check them by an invasion 
of Attica, when sudden and complicated disasters forced 
her to abandon her designs, and turn her attention to 
her own dominions. In 464 b.c. the city was visited by 
an earthquake that laid it in ruins and buried not less 
than twenty thousand of its chosen citizens; and this 
calamity was immediately followed by a general revolt 
of the Helots. Bulwer's description of this terrible 
earthquake, and of the memorable conduct of the Laco- 
nian government in opposing, under such trying cir- 
cumstances, the dreadful revolt that occurred, has been 



RISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 265 

greatly admired for its eloquence and its strict adher- 
ence to facts. 

The Earthquake at Sparta and the Bevolt of the Helots. 

"An earthquake, unprecedented in its violence, oc- 
curred in Sparta. In many places throughout Laconia the 
rocky soil was rent asunder. From Mount Ta-yg'e-tus, 
which overhung the city, and on which the women of 
Lacedsemon were wont to hold their bacchanalian orgies, 
huge fragments rolled into the suburbs. The greater 
portion of the city was absolutely overthrown ; and it is 
said, probably with exaggeration, that only jive houses 
wholly escaped disaster from the shock. This terrible 
calamity did not cease suddenly as it came; its concus- 
sions were repeated ; it buried alike men and treasure : 
could we credit Diodorus, no less than twenty thousand 
persons perished in the shock. Thus depopulated, im- 
poverished, and distressed, the enemies whom the cru- 
elty of Sparta nursed within her bosom resolved to seize 
the moment to execute their vengeance and consum- 
mate her destruction. Under Pausanias the Helots were 
ready for revolt; and the death of that conspirator 
checked, but did not crush, their designs of freedom. 
Now was the moment, when Sparta lay in ruins — now 
was the moment to realize their dreams. From field 
to field, from village to village, the news of the earth- 
quake became the watchword of revolt. Up rose the 
Helots— they armed themselves, they poured on— a wild 
and gathering and relentless multitude resolved to slay, 
by the wrath of man, all whom that of nature had yet 
spared. The earthquake that levelled Sparta rent their 
chains ; nor did the shock create one chasm so dark and 
wide as that between the master and the slave. 

" It is one of the sublimest and most awful spectacles 
in history— that city in ruins— the earth still trembling, 

12 



266 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the grim and dauntless soldiery collected amid piles of 
death and ruin ; and in such a time, and such a scene, 
the multitude sensible not of danger, but of wrong, 
and rising not to succor, but to revenge — all that should 
have disarmed a feebler enmity giving fire to theirs; 
the dreadest calamity their blessing— dismay their hope. 
It was as if the Great Mother herself had summoned 
her children to vindicate the long- abused, the all- in- 
alienable heritage derived from her; and the stir of 
the angry elements was but the announcement of an 
armed and solemn union between nature and the op- 
pressed. 

"Fortunately for Sparta, the danger was not alto- 
gether unforeseen. After the confusion and the horror 
of the earthquake, and while the people, dispersed, were 
seeking to save their effects, Archida'mus, who, four 
years before, had succeeded to the throne of Lacedse- 
mon, ordered the trumpets to sound as to arms. That 
wonderful superiority of man over matter which habit 
and discipline can effect, and which was ever so visible 
among the Spartans, constituted their safety at that 
hour. Forsaking the care of their property, the Spar- 
tans seized their arms, flocked around their king, and 
drew up in disciplined array. In her most imminent 
- crisis Sparta was thus saved. The Helots approached, 
wild, disorderly, and tumultuous ; they came intent only 
to plunder and to slay ; they expected to find scattered 
and affrighted foes — they found a formidable army; 
their tyrants were still their lords. They saw, paused, 
and fled, scattering themselves over the country, excit- 
ing all they met to rebellion, and soon joined with the 
Messenians, kindred to them by blood and ancient rem- 
iniscences of heroic struggles; they seized that same 
Ithome which their hereditary Aristodemus had before 
occupied witli unforgotten valor. This they fortified, 



RISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 267 

and, occupying also the neighboring lands, declared 
open war upon their lords." * 

"The incident here related of the King of Sparta," 
says Alison, " amid the yawning of the earthquake and 
the ruin of his capital, sounding the trumpets to arms, 
and the Lacedaemonians assembling in disciplined array 
around him, is one of the sublimest recorded in history. 
We need not wonder that a people capable of such con- 
duct in such a moment, and trained by discipline and 
habit to such docility in danger, should subsequently 
acquire and maintain supreme dominion in Greece." 
The general insurrection of the Helots is known in his- 
tory as the Third Messenian War. After two or three 
years had passed in vain attempts to capture Ithome, 
the Spartans were obliged to call for aid on the Athe- 
nians, with whom they were still in avowed alliance. 
The friends of Pericles, the rival of Cimon and the 
leader of the democratic party at Athens, opposed 
granting the desired relief; but Cimon, after some diffi- 
culty, persuaded his countrymen to assist the Lacedae- 
monians, and he himself marched with four thousand 
men to Ithome. The aid of the Athenians was solicited 
on account of their acknowledged skill in capturing 
fortified places ; but as Cimon did not succeed in taking 
Ithome, the Spartans became suspicious of his designs, 
and summarily sent him back to Athens. 



III. TnE ACCESSION OF PERICLES TO POWER. 

The ill success of the expedition of Cimon gave Peri- 
cles the opportunity to place himself and the popular 
party in power at Athens ; for the constitutional reforms 
that had been gradually weakening the power of the 



" Athens : Its Rise and Fall," pp. 176, 177. 



268 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

aristocracy were now made available to sweep it almost 
entirely away. The following extract from Bulwer's 
Athens briefly yet fully tells what was accomplished 
in this direction : 

" The Constitution previous to Solon was an oligarchy 
of birth. Solon rendered it an aristocracy of property. 
Clisthenes widened its basis from property to popula- 
tion ; and it was also Clisthenes, in all probability, who 
weakened the more illicit and oppressive influences of 
wealth by establishing the ballot of secret suffrage, in- 
stead of the open voting which was common in the 
time of Solon. The Areop'agus was designed by Solon 
as the aristocratic balance to the popular assembly. This 
constitutional bulwark of the aristocratic party of 
Athens became more and more invidious to the people, 
and when Cimon resisted every innovation on that as- 
sembly he only insured his own destruction, while he 
expedited the policy he denounced. EphiaFtes, the 
friend and spokesman of Pericles, directed all the force 
of the popular opinion against this venerable senate; 
and at length, though not openly assisted by Pericles, 
who took no prominent part in the contention, that 
influential statesman succeeded in crippling its functions 
and limiting its authority." 

With regard to the nature of the constitutional 
changes effected, the same writer adds : " It appears to 
me most probable that the Areopagus retained the right 
of adjudging cases of homicide, and little besides of its 
ancient constitutional authority ; that it lost altogether 
its most dangerous power in the indefinite police it had 
formerly exercised over the habits and morals of the 
people; that any control of the finances was wisely 
transferred to the popular senate ; that its irresponsible 
character was abolished, and that it was henceforth ren- 
dered accountable to the people." The struggle be- 



RISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 269 

tween the contending parties was long and bitter, and 
the fall of Cimon was one of the necessary consequences 
of the political change. Charged, among other things, 
with too great friendship for Sparta, he was driven into 
exile. Pericles now persuaded the Athenians to re- 
nounce the alliance 'with Sparta, and he increased the 
power of Athens by alliances with Argos and other 
cities. He also continued the construction of the long 
walls from Athens to the Piraeus and Phalerum — a 
project that Themistocles had advised and that Cimon 
had commenced. 

The long existing jealousy of Sparta at last broke 
out in open hostilities. While the siege of Ithome was 
in progress, Sparta, still powerful in her alliances, sent 
her allied forces into Bceotia to counteract the growing 
influence of the Athenians in that quarter. The indig- 
nant Athenians, led by Pericles, marched out to meet 
them, but were worsted in the battle of Tan'agra. Be- 
fore this conflict began, Cimon, the banished command- 
er, appeared in the Athenian camp and begged permis- 
sion to enter the ranks against the enemy. His request 
being refused, he left his armor with his friends, of 
whom there were one hundred among the Athenians, 
with the charge to refute, by their valor, the accusation 
that he and they were the friends of Sparta. Every one 
of the one hundred fell in the conflict. About two 
months after, in the early part of the year 456 B.C., the 
Athenians wiped off the stain of their defeat at Tanagra 
by a victory over the combined Theban and Boeotian 
forces, then in alliance with Sparta; whereby the au- 
thority and influence of Sparta were again confined to 
the Peloponnesus. 

The Athenians were now masters of Greece, from the 
Gulf of Corinth to the Pass of Thermopylae, and in 
the following year they sent an expedition round the 



270 MOSAICS OF GEECIAN HISTORY. 

Peloponnesus, which captured, among other cities, 
Naupactus, on the Corinthian Gulf. The third and last 
Messenian war had just been concluded by the surren- 
der of Ithome, on terms which permitted the Messe- 
nians and their families to retire from the Peloponnesus, 
and they joined the colony which Athens planted at 
Naupactus. But the successes of Athens in Greece 
were counterbalanced, in the same year, by reverses in 
Egypt, where the Athenians were fighting Persia in aid 
of In'arus, a Libyan prince. These, with some other 
minor disasters, and the state of bitter feeling that ex- 
isted between the two parties at Athens, induced Peri- 
cles to recall Cimon from exile and put him in com- 
mand of an expedition against Cyprus and Egypt. In 
449, however, Cimon was taken ill, and he died in 
the harbor of Ci'tinm, to which place he was laying 
siege. 

Before the death of Cimon, and through his interven- 
tion, a five years' truce had been concluded with Sparta, 
and soon after his death peace was made with Persia. 
From this time the empire of Athens began to decline. 
In the year 447 b.c. a revolt in Bceotia resulted in the 
overthrow of Athenian supremacy there, while the ex- 
pulsion of the Athenians from Pho'cis and Lo'cris, and 
the revolt of Eubcea and Megara, followed soon after. 
The revolt of Eubcea was soon quelled, but this was the 
only success that Athens achieved. Meanwhile a Spar- 
tan army invaded Attica and marched to the neighbor- 
hood of Eleusis. Having lost much of her empire, with 
a fair prospect of losing all of it if hostilities continued, 
Athens concluded a thirty years' truce with Sparta and 
her allies, by the terms of which she abandoned her con- 
quests in the Peloponnessus, and Megara became an ally 
of Sparta (445 b.c.) 



RISK AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 271 



THE "AGE OF PERICLES." 

With the close of the Persian contest, and the begin- 
ning of the Thirty Years' Truce, properly begins what 
has been termed the "Age of Pericles "—the inaugura- 
tion of a new and important era of Athenian greatness 
and renown. Having won the highest military honors 
and political ascendency, Athens now took the lead in 
intellectual progress. Themistocles and Cimon had re- 
stored to Athens all that of which Xerxes had despoiled 
it — the former having rebuilt its ruins, and the latter 
having given to its public buildings a degree of mag- 
nificence previously unknown. But Pericles surpassed 
them both : 

He was the ruler of the land 

When Athens was the land of fame ; 

He was the light that led the band 
When each was like a living flame ; 

The centre of earth's noblest ring, 

Of more than men the more than king. 

Yet not by fetter nor by spear 
His sovereignty was held or won : 

Feared — but alone as freemen fear ; 
Loved — but as freemen love alone ; 

He waved the sceptre o'er his kind 

By nature's first great title — mind! Croly. 

Orator and philosopher, as well as statesman and gen- 
eral, Pericles had the most lofty views. " Athens," says 
a modern writer, " was to become not only the capital of 
Greece, but the centre of art and refinement, and, at the 
same time, of those democratical theories which formed 
the beau ideal of the Athenian notions of government." 
Athens became the centre and capital of the most pol- 



272 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ished communities of Greece; she drew into a focus all 
the Grecian intellect, and she obtained from her depend- 
ents the wealth to administer the arts, which universal 
traffic and intercourse taught her to appreciate. The 
treasury of the state being placed in the hands of Peri- 
cles, he knew no limit to expenditure but the popular 
will, which, fortunately for the glories of Grecian art, 
kept pace with the vast conceptions of the master de- 
signer. Most of those famous structures that crowned 
the Athenian Acropolis, or surrounded its base, were 
either built or adorned by his direction, under the su- 
perintendence of the great sculptor, Phidias. The Par- 
thenon, the Ode'um, the gold and ivory statue of the 
goddess Minerva, and the Olympian Jupiter — the latter 
two the work of the great sculptor himself — were alone 
sufficient to immortalize the "Age of Pericles." Of 
these miracles of sculpture and of architecture, as well 
as of the literature of this period, we shall speak farther 
in a subsequent place. 

Of the general condition and appearance of Athens 
during the fourteen years that the Thirty Years' Truce 
was observed, Haygarth gives us the following poetical 

description : 

All the din of war 

Was hushed to rest. Within a city's walls, 

Beneath a marble portico, were seen 

Statesmen and orators, in robes of peace, 

Holding; discourse. The assembled multitude 

Sat in the crowded theatre, and bent 

To hear the voice of gorgeous Tragedy 

Breathing, in solemn verse, or ode sublime, 

Her noble precepts. The broad city's gates 

Poured forth a mingled throng — impatient steeds 

Champing their bits, and neighing for the course : 

Merchants slow driving to the busy port 

Their ponderous wains : Religion's holy priests 



RISE AND GROWTH OF THE ATHENIAN EMPIRE. 273 

Leading her red-robed votaries to the steps 

Of some vast temple : young and old, with hands 

Crossed on their breasts, hastening to walks and shades 

Suburban, where some moralist explained 

The laws of mind and virtue. On a rock 

A varied group appeared : some dragged along 

The rough-hewn block ; some shaped it into form ; 

Some reared the column, or with chisel traced 

Forms more than human ; while Content sat near, 

And cheered with songs the toil of Industry. 

But, as the poet adds, 

Soon passed this peaceful pageant : "War again 
Brandished his bloody lance — 

and then began that dismal period between the "Age of 
Pericles " and the interference of the Romans — embrac- 
ing the three Peloponnesian wars, the rising power of 
Macedonia under Philip of Macedon, the wars of Alex- 
ander and the contentions that followed — known as the 
period of the civil convulsions of Greece. 

12* 



274 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTEE XI. 

THE PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND THE FALL OF ATHENS. 

CAUSES OF THE FIRST WAR. 

The various successful schemes of Pericles for enrich- 
ing and extending the power of Athens were regarded 
with fear and jealousy by Sparta and her allies, who 
were only waiting for a reasonable excuse to renew hos- 
tilities. The opportunity came in 435 b.c. Corinth, the 
ally of Sparta, had become involved in a war with Cor- 
ey ; ra, one of her colonies, when the latter applied to 
Athens for assistance. Pericles persuaded the Athe- 
nians to grant the assistance, and a small fleet was de- 
spatched to Corcyra. The engagement that ensued, in 
which the Athenian ships bore a part— the greatest con- 
test, Thucydides observes, that had taken place between 
Greeks to that day — was favorable to the Corinthians; 
but the sight of a larger Athenian squadron advancing 
toward the scene of action caused the Corinthians to re- 
treat. This first breach of the truce was soon followed 
by another. Potidse'a, a Corinthian colony, but tribu- 
tary to Athens, revolted, on account of some unjust de- 
mands that the Athenians had enforced against it, and 
claimed and obtained the assistance of the Corinthians. 
Thus, in two instances, were Athens and Corinth, 
though nominally at peace, brought into conflict as 
open enemies. 

THE CONGRESS AT SPARTA. -THE PERSECUTION OF PERICLES. 

The Lacedaemonians meanwhile called a meeting of 
the Peloponnesian Confederacy at Sparta, at which 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 275 

^Egina, Meg'ara, and other states made their complaints 
against Athens. It was also attended by envoys from 
Athens, who seriously warned it not to force Athens 
into a struggle that would be waged for its very exist- 
ence. But a majority of the Confederacy were of the 
opinion that Athens had violated her treaties, and the 
result of the deliberations was a declaration of war 
against her. Not with any real desire for peace, but in 
order to gain time for her preparations before the decla- 
ration was made public, Sparta opened negotiations with 
Athens; but her preliminary demands were of course 
refused, while her ultimatum, that Athens should restore 
to the latter's allies their independence, was met with a 
like demand by the Athenians — that no state in Pelo- 
ponnesus should be forced to accommodate itself to the 
principles in vogue at Sparta. "Let this be our an- 
swer," said Pericles, in closing his speech in the Athe- 
nian assembly : " We have no wish to begin war, but 
whosoever attacks us, him we mean to repel ; for our 
guiding principle ought to be no other than this : that 
the power of that state which our fathers made great 
we will hand down undiminished to our posterity." 
The advice of Pericles was adopted, all farther negotia- 
tions were thereupon concluded, and Athens prepared 
for war. 

Although the political authority of Pericles was now 
at its height, and his services were receiving unwonted 
public recognition, he had many enemies among all 
classes of citizens, who made his position for a time ex- 
tremely hazardous. These at first attacked his friends 
— Phidias, Anaxagoras, Aspasia, and others — who were 
prominent representatives of his opinions and designs. 
The former was falsely accused of theft, in having re- 
tained for himself a part of the gold furnished to him 
for the golden robe of Athene Par'thenos, and of im- 



276 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

piety, for having reproduced his own features in one of 
the numerous figures on the shield of the goddess. He 
was cast into prison, where he died before his trial was 
concluded. Anaxagoras, having exposed himself to the 
penalties of a decree by which all who abjured the cur- 
rent religious views were to be indicted and tried as 
state criminals, barely escaped with his life ; while As- 
pasia, the mistress of Pericles, charged with impiety and 
base immorality, was only saved by the eloquence and 
tears of the great statesman, which flowed freely and 
successfully in her behalf before the jury. Finally, Per- 
icles was attacked in person. He was accused of a waste 
of the public moneys, and was commanded to render an 
exact account of his expenditures. Although he came 
forth victorious from this and all other attacks, it is evi- 
dent, as one historian observes, that " the endeavors of 
his enemies did not fail to exercise a certain influence 
upon the masses; and this led Pericles, who believed 
that war was in any case inevitable, to welcome its 
speedy commencement, as he hoped that the common 
danger would divert public attention from home affairs, 
render harmless the power of his adversaries, strengthen 
patriotic feeling, and make manifest to the Athenians 
their need of his services. 5 " 



I. THE FIRST PELOPONNESIAN WAR. 

On the side of Sparta was arrayed the whole of Pel- 
oponnesus, except Argos and Acha'ia, together with the 
Megarians, Phocians, Locrians, Thebans, and some oth- 
ers; while the allies of Athens were the Thessalians, 
Acarnanians, Messenians, Platseans, -Ghi'ans, Lesbians, 
her tributary towns in Thrace and Asia Minor, and all 
the islands north of Crete with two exceptions— "Me'los 
and The'ra, Hostilities were precipitated by a treacher- 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 277 

ous attack of the Thebans upon Platsea in 431 b.c. ; and 
before the close of the same year a Spartan army of 
sixty thousand ravaged Attica, and sat down before the 
very gates of Athens, while the naval forces of the 
Athenians desolated the coasts of the Peloponnesus. 
The Spartans were soon called from Attica to protect 
their homes, and Pericles himself, at the head of a large 
force, spread desolation over the little territory of Meg- 
aris. This expedition closed the hostilities for the year, 
and, on his return to Athens, Pericles was intrusted with 
the duty of pronouncing the oration at the public fu- 
neral which, in accordance with the custom of the coun- 
try, was solemnized for those who had fallen in the war. 
This occasion afforded Pericles an opportunity to ani- 
mate the courage and the hopes of his countrymen, by 
such a description of 'the glories and the possibilities of 
Athens as he alone could give. Commencing his ad- 
dress with a eulogy on the ancestors and immediate fore- 
fathers of the Athenians, he proceeds to show the lat- 
ter " by what form of civil polity, what dispositions and 
habits of life," they have attained their greatness ; graph- 
ically contrasting their institutions with those of other 
states, and especially with those of the Spartans, their 
present enemies. 

The Oration of Pericles. 1 

"We enjoy a form of government not framed on an 
imitation of the institutions of neighboring states, but 
are ourselves rather a model to, than imitative of, oth- 
ers; and which, from the government being adminis- 
tered not for the few but for the many, is denominated 
a democracy. According to its laws, all participate in 



From "History of Thucydides," translated by S. T. Bloomfield, D D 
ir.sr.fi ' ' '* 



vol. i., p. 366 



278 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

an equality of rights as to the determination of private 
suits, and every one is preferred to public offices with a 
regard to the reputation he holds, and according as each 
is in estimation for anything ; not so much for being of 
a particular class as for his personal merit, Nor is any 
person who can, in whatever way, render service to the 
state kept back on account of poverty or obscurity of 
station. Thus liberally are our public affairs adminis- 
tered, and thus liberally, too, do we conduct ourselves as 
to mutual suspicions in our private and every-day inter- 
course ; not bearing animosity toward our neighbor for 
following his own humor, nor darkening our counte- 
nance with the scowl of censure, which pains though it 
cannot punish. While, too, we thus mix together in 
private intercourse without irascibility or moroseness, 
we are, in our public and political capacity, cautiously 
studious not to offend ; yielding a prompt obedience to 
the authorities for the time being, and to the established 
laws ; especially those which are enacted for the benefit 
of the injured, and such as, though unwritten, reflect a 
confessed disgrace on the transgressors." 

Having referred to the recreation provided for the 
public mind by the exhibition of games and sacrifices 
throughout the whole year, as well as to some points in 
military matters in which the Athenians excel, Pericles 
proceeds as follows : " In these respects, then, is our city 
worthy of admiration, and in others also; for we study 
elegance combined with frugality, and cultivate philoso- 
phy without effeminacy. Eiches we employ at oppor- 
tunities for action, rather than as a subject of wordy 
boast. To confess poverty with us brings no disgrace ; 
not to endeavor to escape it by exertion is disgrace in- 
deed. There exists, moreover, in the same persons an 
attention both to their domestic concerns and to pub- 
lic affairs ; and even among such others as are engaged 



PELOPONNESIAN WAKS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 279 

in agricultural occupations or handicraft labor there is 
found a tolerable portion of political knowledge. We 
are the only people who account him that takes no share 
in politics, not as an intermeddler in nothing, but one 
who is good for nothing. We are, too, persons who 
examine aright, or, at least, fully revolve in mind our 
measures, not thinking that words are any hinderance to 
deeds, but that the hinderance rather consists in the not 
being informed by words previously to setting about in 
deed what is to be done. For we possess this point of 
superiority over others, that we execute a bold prompti- 
tude in what we undertake, and yet a cautious prudence 
in taking forethought; whereas with others it is ig- 
norance alone that makes them daring, while reflection 
makes them dastardly. * * * 

"In short, I may affirm that the city at large is the 
instructress of (Greece, and that individually each per- 
son among us seems to possess the most ready versa- 
tility in adapting himself, and that not ungracefully, to 
the greatest variety of circumstances and situations that 
diversify human life. That all this is not a mere boast 
of words for the present purpose, but rather the actual 
truth, this very power of the state, unto which by these 
habits and dispositions we have attained, clearly at- 
tests ; for ours is the only one of the states now exist- 
ing which, on trial, approves itself greater than report ; 
it alone occasions neither to an invading enemy ground 
for chagrin at being worsted by such, nor to a subject 
state aught of self-reproach, as being under the power 
of those unworthy of empire. A power do we display 
not unwitnessed, but attested by signs illustrious, which 
will make us the theme of admiration both to the pres- 
ent and future ages; nor need we either a Homer, or 
any such panegyrist, who might, indeed, for the pres- 
ent delight with his verses, but any idea of our actions 



280 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

thence formed the actual truth of them might destroy : 
nay, every sea and every land have we compelled to be- 
come accessible to our adventurous courage ; and every- 
where have we planted eternal monuments both of good 
and of evil. For such a state, then, these our departed 
heroes (unwilling to be deprived of it) magnanimously 
fought and fell; and in such a cause it is right that 
every one of us, the survivors, should readily encounter 
toils and dangers." 

After paying a handsome tribute to the memory of 
the departed warriors whose virtues, he says, helped to 
adorn Athens with all that makes it the theme of his 
encomiums, Pericles exhorts his hearers to emulate the 
spirit of those who contributed to their country the no- 
blest sacrifice. "They bestowed," he adds, "their per- 
sons and their lives upon the public ; and therefore, as 
their private recompense, they receive a deathless re- 
nown and the noblest of sepulchres, 1 not so much that 
wherein their bones are entombed as in which their 
glory is preserved — to be had in everlasting remem- 
brance on all occasions, whether of speech or action. 
For to the illustrious the whole earth is a sepulchre; 
nor do monumental inscriptions in their own country 
alone point it out, but an unwritten and mental me- 
morial in foreign lands, which, more durable than any 
monument, is deeply seated in the breast of every one. 
Imitating, then, these illustrious models — accounting 
that happiness is liberty, and that liberty is valor— be 



i While kings, in dusty darkness hid, 
Have left a nameless pju-amid, 
Thy heroes, though the general doom 
Hath swept the column from their tomb, 
A mightier monument command — 
The mountains of their native land ! 
These, points thy muse, to stranger's eye— 
The graves of those that cannot die ! Bykon. 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 281 

not backward to encounter the perils of war. 1 For the 
unfortunate and hopeless are not those who have most 
reason to be lavish of their lives, but rather such as, 
while they live, have to hazard a chance to the opposite, 
and who have most at stake; since great would be the 
reverse should they fall into adversity. For to the 
high-minded, at least, more grievous is misfortune over- 
whelming them amid the blandishments of prosperity, 
than the stroke of death overtaking them in the full 
pulse of vigor and common hope, and, moreover, almost 
unfelt." * * * 

Says the historian from whose work the speech of 
Pericles is taken: "Such was the funeral solemnity 
which took place this winter, with the expiration of 
which the first year of the war was brought to a close." 
Dr. Ernst Curtius comments as follows on the ora- 
tion : "With lofty simplicity Pericles extols the Athe- 
nian Constitution, popular in the fullest sense through 
having for its object the welfare of the entire peopfe, 
and offering equal rights to all the citizens; but at the 
same time, and in virtue of this its character, adapted 
for raising the best among them to the first positions in 
the state. He lauds the high spiritual advantages of- 
fered by the city, the liberal love of virtue and wisdom 
on the part of her sons, their universal sympathy in the 
common weal, their generous hospitality, their temper- 
ance and vigor, which peace and the love of the beauti- 
ful had not weakened, so that the city of the Athenians 
must, in any event, be an object of well -deserved ad- 
miration both for the present and for future ages. Such 

1 It was a kindred spirit that led our own great statesman, Webster in 
quoting from this oration, to ask : " Is it Athens or America * i s Athens 
or America the theme of these immortal strains ? Was Pericles speaking 
of his own country as he saw it or knew it? or was he gazing upon a 
bright vision, then two thousand years before him, which we see in realitv 
as he saw it in prospect ?" 



282 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

were the points of view from which Pericles displayed 
to the citizens the character of their state, and described 
to them the people of Athens, as it ought to be. He 
showed them their better selves, in order to raise them 
above themselves and arouse them to self-denial, to en- 
durance, and to calm resolution. Full of a new vital 
ardor they returned home from the graves, and with 
perfect confidence confronted the destinies awaiting 
them in the future." * 

THE PLAGUE AT ATHENS. 

In the spring of 430 b.c. the Spartans again invaded 
Attica, and the Athenians shut themselves up in Athens. 
But here the plague, a calamity more dreadful than war, 
attacked them and swept away multitudes. This plague, 
which not only devastated Athens, but other Grecian 
cities also, is described at considerable length, with a 
harrowing minuteness of detail, by the Latin poet Lu- 
cretius. His description is based upon the account 
given by Thucydides. We give here only the begin- 
ning and the close of it: 

A plague like this, a tempest big with fate, 
Once ravaged Athens and her sad domains ; 
Unpeopled all the city, and her paths 
Swept with destruction. For amid the realms 
Begot of Egypt, many a mighty tract 
Of ether traversed, many a flood o'erpassed, 
At length here fixed it ; o'er the hapless realm 
Of Cecrops hovering, and the astonished race 
Dooming by thousands to disease and death. 

*••'"'• * * * 

Thus seized the dread, unmitigated pest 
Man after man, and day succeeding day, 



i " 



The History of Greece," vol. Hi., p. 66 ; by Dr. Ernst Curtius. 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 283 

With taint voracious ; like the herds they fell 

Of bellowing- beeves, or flocks of timorous sheep : 

On funeral, funeral hence forever piled. 

E'en he who fled the afflicted, urged by love 

Of life too fond, and trembling for his fate, 

Repented soon severely, and himself 

Sunk in his guilty solitude, devoid 

Of friends, of succor, hopeless and forlorn ; 

While those who nursed them, to the pious task 

Housed by their prayers, with piteous moans commixt, 

Fell irretrievable: the best by far, 

The worthiest, thus most frequent met their doom. 

Trans, by J. Mason Good. 

THE DEATH OF PERICLES. 

Oppressed by both war and pestilence, the Athenians 
were seized with rage and despair, and accused Pericles 
of being the author of their misfortunes. But that de- 
termined man still adhered to his plans, and endeavored 
to soothe the popular mind by an expedition against 
Peloponnesus, which he commanded in person. After 
committing devastations upon various parts of the ene- 
my's coasts, Pericles returned to find the people still 
more impatient of the war and clamorous for peace. 
An embassy was sent to Sparta with proposals for a 
cessation of hostilities, but it was dismissed without a 
hearing. This repulse increased the popular exaspera- 
tion, and, although at an assembly that he called for 
the purpose Pericles succeeded, by his power of speech, 
in quieting the people, and convincing them of the 
justice and patriotism of his course, his political enemies 
charged him with peculation, of which he was convicted, 
and his nomination as general was cancelled. He re- 
tired to private life, but his successors in office were 
incompetent and irresolute, and it was not long before 
he was re-elected general. He appeared to recover his 



284 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ascendency ; but in the middle of the third year of the 
war he died, a victim to the plague. 

He perished, but his wreath was won ; 

He perished in his height of fame : 
Then sunk the cloud on Athens' sun, 

Yet still she conquered in his name. 
Filled with his soul, she could not die ; 
Her conquest was Posterity ! Crolt. 

Thucydides relates that when Pericles was near his 
end, and apparently insensible, the friends who had 
gathered round his bed relieved their sorrow by recall- 
ing the remembrance of his military exploits, and of 
the trophies which he had raised. He interrupted them, 
observing that they bad omitted the most glorious praise 
which he could claim : " Other generals have been as 
fortunate, but I have never caused the Athenians to 
put on mourning "-—referring, doubtless, to his success 
in achieving important advantages with but little loss 
of life; and which Thiklwall considers "a singular 
ground of satisfaction, if Pericles had been conscious of 
having involved his country in the bloodiest war it had 

ever waged." 

The success of Pericles in retaining, for so many 
years, his great influence over the Athenian people, 
must be attributed, in large part, to his wonderful pow- 
ers of persuasion. Cicero is said to have regarded him 
as the first example of an almost perfect orator; and 
Bulwer says that "the diction of his speeches, and -that 
consecutive logic which preparation alone can impart to 
language, became irresistible to a people that had itself 
become a Pericles." Whatever may be said of Pericles 
as a politician, his intellectual superiority cannot be 
questioned. As the accomplished man of genius, and 
the liberal patron of literature and art, he is worthy of 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 285 

the highest admiration ; for " by these qualities he has 
justly given name to the most brilliant intellectual 
epoch that the world has ever seen." The following 
extract from Mitford's History of Greece, may be con- 
sidered a correct sketch of the great democratic ruler : 

The Character of Pericles. 

"No other man seems to have been held in so high 
estimation by most of the ablest writers of Greece and 
Rome, for universal superiority of talents, as Pericles. 
The accounts remaining of his actions hardly support 
liis renown, which was yet, perhaps, more fairly earned 
than that of many, the merit of whose achievements has 
been, in a great degree, due to others acting under them, 
whose very names have perished. The philosophy of 
Pericles taught him not to be vain-glorious, but to rest 
his fame upon essentially great and good rather than 
upon brilliant actions. It is observed by Plutarch that, 
often as he commanded the Athenian forces, he never 
was defeated; yet, though he won many trophies, he 
never gained a splendid victory. A battle, according to 
a great modern authority, is the resource of ignorant 
generals ; when they know not what to do they fight a 
battle. It was almost universally the resource of the 
age of Pericles; little conception was entertained of 
military operations beyond ravage and a battle. His 
genius led him to a superior system, which the wealth 
of his country enabled him to carry into practice. His 
favorite maxim was to spare the lives of his soldiers; 
and scarcely any general ever gained so many important 
advantages with so little bloodshed. * * * 

" This splendid character, however, perhaps may seem 
to receive some tarnish from the political conduct of 
Pericles ; the concurrence, at least, which is imputed to 
him, in depraving the Athenian Constitution, to favor 



286 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

that popular power by which he ruled, and the revival 
and confirmation of that pernicious hostility between the 
democratic^, and aristocratical interests, first in Athens 
and then by the Peloponnesian war throughout the na- 
tion. But the high respect with which he is always 
spoken of by three men in successive ages, Thucydides, 
Xenophon, and Isoc'rates, all friendly to the aristocrat- 
ical interest, and all anxious for concord with Lacedse- 
mon, strongly indicates that what may appear exception- 
able in his conduct was, in their opinion, the result, not 
of choice, but of necessity. By no other conduct, prob- 
ably, could the independence of Athens have been pre- 
served ; and yet that, as the event showed, was indis- 
pensable for the liberty of Greece." 



II. THE ATHENIAN DEMAGOGUES. 

Soon after the death of Pericles the results of the 
political changes introduced by him, as well as of the 
moral and social changes that had taken place in the 
people from various causes, became apparent in the 
raising to power of men from the lower walks of life, 
whose popularity was achieved and maintained main- 
ly by intrigue and flattery. Chief among these rose 
Cle'on, a tanner, who has been characterized as " the 
violent demagogue whose arrogant presumption so un- 
worthily succeeded the enlightened magnanimity of 
Pericles." In the year 428 Mityle'ne, the capital of 
the Island of Lesbos, revolted against the supremacy 
of Athens, but was speedily reduced to subjection, and 
one thousand or more Mityleneans were sent as pris- 
oners to Athens, to be disposed of as the Athenian 
assembly should direct. Cleon first prominently ap- 
pears in public in connection with the disposal of these 
prisoners. With the capacity to transact business in a 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 287 

popular manner, and possessing a stentorian voice and 
unbounded audacity, he had become " by far the most 
persuasive speaker in the eyes of the people ;" and 
now, taking the lead in the assembly debate, he suc- 
ceeded in having the unfortunate prisoners cruelly put 
to death. From this period his influence steadily in- 
creased, and in the year 425 he was elected commander 
of the Athenian forces. For several years circumstances 
favored him. With the aid of his general, Demos- 
thenes, he captured Py'lus from the Spartans, and on 
his return to Athens he was received with demonstra- 
tions of great favor ; but his military incompetency 
lost him both the victory and his life in the battle of 
Amphip'olis, 422 b.c. 

What we know of the political conduct of Cleon 
comes from measurably unreliable sources. Aristoph'- 
anes, the chief of the comic poets, describes him as " a 
noisy brawler, loud in his criminations, violent in his 
gestures, corrupt and venal in his principles, a perse- 
cutor of rank and merit, and a base flatterer and syco- 
phant of the people." Thncydides also calls him " a dis- 
honest politician, a wrongful accuser of others, and the 
most violent of all the citizens." Both these writers, 
however, had personal grievances. Of course Cleon very 
naturally became a target for the invective of the poet. 
"The taking of Pylus," says Gillies, "and the trium- 
phant return of Cleon, a notorious coward transformed 
by caprice and accident into a brave and successful com- 
mander, were topics well suiting the comic vein of Aris- 
tophanes ; and in the comedy first represented in the sev- 
enth year of the war— The Knights— he attacks him in 
the moment of victory, when fortune had rendered him 
the idol of a licentious multitude, when no comedian 
was so daring as to play his character, and no painter so 
bold as to design his mask." The poet himself, there- 



\ 



288 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

fore, appeared on the stage, " only disguising his face, 
the better to represent the part of Cleon." As another 
writer has said, " Of all the productions of Aristophanes, 
so replete with comic genius throughout, The Knights is 
the most consummate and irresistible ; and it presents a 
portrait of Cleon drawn in colors broad and glaring, most 
impressive to the imagination, and hardly effaceable from 
the memory." The following extract from the play 
will show the license indulged in on the stage in demo- 
cratic Athens, the boldness of the poet's attacks, and 
will serve, also, as a sample of his style : 

Cleon the Demagogue. 

The chorus come upon the stage, and thus commence 
their attack upon Cleon : 

Chorus. Close around him, and confound him, the con- 
founder of us all ; 
Pelt him, pummel him, and maul him ; rummage, ransack, over- 
haul him ; 
Overbear him and outbawl him ; bear him down, and bring him 

under. 
Bellow, like a burst of thunder, robber ! harpy! sink of plunder! 
Rogue and villain ! rogue and cheat! rogue and villain, I repeat! 
Oftener than I can repeat it has the rogue and villain cheated. 
Close around him, left and right; spit upon him, spurn and 

smite : 
Spit upon him as you see ; spurn and spit at him like me. 
But beware, or he'll evade you ! for he knows the private track 
Where Eu'crates was seen escaping with his mill-dust on his 

back. 
Cleon. Worthy veterans of the jury, you that, either right 

or wrong, 
With my threepenny provision I've maintained and cherished 

long, 
Come to my aid! I'm here waylaid— assassinated and betrayed! 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 289 

Chorus. Rightly served ! we serve you rightly, for your hun- 
gry love of pelf ; 
For your gross and greedy rapine, gormandizing by yourself — 
You that, ere the figs are gathered, pilfer with a privy twitch 
Fat delinquents and defaulters, pulpy, luscious, plump, and 

rich ; 
Pinching, fingering, and pulling — tempering, selecting, cull- 
ing; 
With a nice survey discerning which arc green and which are 

turning, 
Which are ripe for accusation, forfeiture, and confiscation. 
Him, besides, the wealthy man, retired upon an easy rent, 
Hating and avoiding party, noble-minded, indolent, 
Fearful of official snares, intrigues, and intricate affairs — 
Him you mark; you fix and hook him, while he's gaping un- 
awares ; 
At a fling, at once you bring him hither from the Cherso- 
nese ; 
Down you cast him, roast and baste him, and devour him at 
your ease. 
Clean. Yes; assault, insult, abuse me! This is the return I 
find 
For the noble testimony, the memorial I designed : 
Meaning to propose proposals for a monument of stone, 
On the which your late achievements should be carved and 
neatly done. 
Chorus. Out, away with him ! the slave ! the pompous, 
empty, fawning knave ! 
Does he think with idle speeches to delude and cheat us all, 
As he does the doting elders that attend his daily call ? 
Pelt him here, and bang him there; and here, and there, and 
everywhere. 
Cleon. Save me, neighbors! Oh, the monsters! @h, my 

side, my back, my breast ! 
Chorus. What! you're forced to call for help? you brutal, 
overpowering pest ! 

[Cleon is pelted of the stage, pursued by the Chorus. 

f3 



290 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

THE PEACE OF NrCI-AS. 

The struggle between Sparta and Athens continued 
ten years without intermission, and without any suc- 
cesses of a decisive character on either side. In the 
eleventh year of the struggle (421 b.c.) a treaty for a 
term of fifty years was concluded— called the Peace of 
Nicias, in honor of the Athenian general of that name 
—by which the towns captured during the war were to 
be restored, and both Athens and Sparta placed in much 
the same state as when hostilities commenced. But this 
proved to be a hollow truce ; for the war was a virtual 
triumph for Athens— and interest, inclination, and the 
ambitious views of her party leaders were not long in 
finding plausible pretexts for renewing the struggle. 
Again, the Boeotian, Megarian, and Corinthian allies of 
Sparta refused to carry out the terms of the treaty by 
making the required surrenders, and Sparta had no 
power to compel them, while Athens would accept no 
less than she had bargained for. 

The Athenian general Nicias, through whose influence 
the Fifty Years' Truce had been concluded, endeavored 
to carry out its terms ; but through the artifices of Al- 
cibi'ades, a nephew of Pericles, a wealthy Athenian, and 
an artful demagogue, the treaty was soon dishonored 
on the part of Athens. Alcibiades also managed^ to 
involve the Spartans in a war with their recent allies, 
the Ar'gives, during which was fought the battle of 
Mantine'a, 418 b.c, in which the Spartans were victori- 
ous; and he induced the Athenians to send an arma- 
ment against the Dorian island of Me'los, which had 
provoked the enmity of Athens by its attachment to 
Sparta, and which was compelled, after a vigorous siege, 
to surrender at discretion. Meanwhile the feeble resist- 
ance of Sparta, and her apparent timidity, encouraged 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 291 

Athens to resume a project of aggrandizement which 
she had once before undertaken, but had been obliged 
to relinquish. This was no less than the virtual con- 
quest of Sicily, whose important cities, under the leader- 
ship of Syracuse, had some years before joined the 
Peloponnesian confederacy. 



III. THE SICILIAN EXPEDITION. 

Although opposed by Nicias, Socrates, and a few of 
the wiser heads at Athens, the counsels of Alcibiades 
prevailed, and, after three months of great preparation, 
an expedition sailed from Athens for Sicily, under the 
plea of delivering the town of Eges'ta from the tyranny 
of Syracuse (415 B.C.). The armament fitted out on this 
occasion, the most powerful that had ever left a Gre- 
cian port, was intrusted to the joint command of (Al- 
cibiades, Nicias, and Lam/achus.N The expedition capt- 
ured the city of Cat'ana, which was made the head- 
quarters of the armament; but here Alcibiades was 
summoned to Athens on the absurd charge of impiety 
and sacrilege, connected with the mutilation of the 
statues of the god Her'mes, that had taken place just 
before he left Athens. He was also charged with having 
profaned the Eleusinian mysteries by giving a repre- 
sentation of them in his own house. Fearing to trust 
himself to the giddy multitude in a trial for life, Al- 
cibiades at once threw himself upon the generosity of 
his open enemies, and sought refuge at Sparta. When, 
soon after, he heard that the Athenians had condemned 
him to death, he answered, "I will show them that I 
am still alive." 

By the death of Lamachus, Nicias was soon after left 
in sole command of the Athenians. He succeeded in 
landing near Syracuse and defeating the Syracusans in 



292 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

a well-fought engagement; but he wasted his time in 
fortifying his camp, and in useless negotiations, until 
his enemies, having received aid from Corinth and 
Sparta, under the Spartan general Gylip'pus, were able 
to bid him defiance. Although new forces were sent 
from Athens, under the Athenian general Demosthenes, 
the Athenians were defeated in several engagements, 
and their entire force was nearly destroyed (413 B.C.). 
"Never, in Grecian history," says Thuctdides, "had 
ruin so complete and sweeping, or victory so glorious 
and unexpected, been witnessed." Both Nicias and 
Demosthenes were captured and put to death, and the 
Syracusans also captured seven thousand prisoners and 
sold them as slaves. Some of the latter, however, are 
said to have received milder treatment than the others, 
owing, it is supposed, to their familiarity with the works 
of the then popular poet, Eurip'ides, which in Sicily, 
historians tell us, were more celebrated than known. It 
is to this incident, probably, that reference is made by 
Byron in the following lines : 

When Athens' armies fell at Syracuse, 
And fettered thousands bore the yoke of war, 
Redemption rose up in the Attic Muse— 
Her voice their only ransom from afar. 
See ! as they chant the tragic hymn, the car 
Of the o'ermastcred victor stops ; the reins 
Fall from his hands— his idle scimitar 
Starts from its belt— he rends his captive's chains, 
And bids him thank the bard for freedom and his strains. 

Childe Harold, IV., 16. 

IV. THE SECOND PELOPONNESIAN WAR. 

The aid which Gylippus had rendered the Syracusans 
now brought Sparta and Athens in direct conflict. The 
result of the Athenian expedition was the greatest calam- 



PELOPONNESIAN WAKS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 293 

ity that had befallen Athens, and the city was filled 
with affliction and dismay. The Spartans made frequent 
forays into Attica, and Athens was almost in a state of 
siege, while several of her allies, instigated by Alcibi- 
ades, who was active in the Spartan councils, revolted 
and joined the Spartans. It was not long, however, be- 
fore Athens regained her wonted determination and be- 
gan to repair her wasted energies. Samos still remained 
faithful to her interests, and, with her help, a new fleet 
was built, with which Lesbos was recovered, and a vic- 
tory was obtained over the Peloponnesians at Miletus. 
Soon after this defeat Alcibiades, who had forfeited the 
confidence of the Spartans by his conduct, was de- 
nounced as a traitor and condemned to death. He es- 
caped to the court of Tissapher'nes, the most powerful 
Persian satrap in Asia Minor. By his intrigues Alcibi- 
(ides, who now sought a reconciliation with his country- 
men, partially detached Tissaphernes from the interests 
of Sparta, and offered the Athenians a Persian alliance 
as the price of his restoration to his country. Put, as he 
feared and hated the Athenian democracy, he insisted 
that an oligarchy should be established in its place. 

The Athenian generals accepted the proposal as the 
only means of salvation for Athens ; and, although they 
subsequently discovered that Alcibiades could not per- 
form what he had undertaken, a change of government 
was effected, after much opposition from the people, 
from a democracy to an aristocracy of four hundred of 
the nobility; but the new government, dreading the 
ambition of Alcibiades, refused to recall him. Another 
change soon followed. The defeat of the Athenian navy 
at Ere'tria, and the revolt of Eubcea, produced a new rev- 
olution at Athens, by which the government of the four 
hundred was overthrown, and democracy restored. Al- 
cibiades was now recalled: but before his return he 



294: MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

aided in destroying the Peloponnesian fleet in the battle 
of Cys'icus (411 b.c.). He was welcomed at Athens with 
great enthusiasm, a golden crown was decreed him, and 
he was appointed commander-in-chief of all the forces 
of the commonwealth both by land and by sea. 

THE HUMILIATION OF ATHENS. 

Alcibiades was still destined to experience the insta- 
bility of fortune. He sailed from Athens in September, 
407, and proceeded to Samos. While he was absent 
from the main body of his fleet on a predatory excur- 
sion, one of his subordinates, contrary to instructions, 
attacked a Spartan fleet and was defeated with a loss of 
fifteen ships. Although in command of a splendid 
force, Alcibiades had accomplished really nothing, and 
had now lost a part of his fleet. An unjust suspicion of 
treachery fell upon him, the former charges against him 
were revived, and he was deprived of his command and 
again banished. In the year 406 the Athenians defeated 
a large Spartan fleet under Callicrat'idas, but their vic- 
tory secured them no permanent advantages. Lysancler, 
a general whose abilities the Athenians could not match 
since they had deprived themselves of the services of 
Alcibiades, was now in command of the Spartan forces* 
He obtained the favor of Cyrus, the youngest son of the 
King of Persia, who had been invested with authority 
over the whole maritime region of Asia Minor, and, 
aided by Persian gold, he manned a numerous fleet with 
which he met the Athenians at iE'gos-pot'ami, on the 
Hellespont, destroyed most of their ships, and captured 
three thousand prisoners (405 b.c). The maritime allies 
of Athens immediately submitted to Lysander, who di- 
rected the Athenians throughout Greece to repair at 
once to Athens, with threats of death to all whom he 
found elsewhere ; and when famine began to prey upon 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 295 

the collected multitude in the city, he appeared before 
the Piraeus with his fleet, while a large Spartan array 
blockaded Athens by land. 

The Athenians had no hopes of effectual resistance, 
and only delayed the surrender of their city to plead for 
the best terms that could be obtained. Compelled at 
last to submit to whatever terms were dictated to them, 
they agreed to destroy their long walls and fortifica- 
tions ; to surrender all their ships but twelve ; to restore 
their exiles ; to relinquish their conquests ; to become a 
member of the Peloponnesian Confederacy ; and to serve 
Sparta in all her expeditions, whether by land or by sea. 
Thus fell imperial Athens (404 B.C.), in the seventy-third 
year after the formation of the Confederacy of Delos, 
the origin of her subsequent empire. Soon after this 
event, and in the same year, Alcibiades, who had been 
honored by both Athens and Sparta, and was now the 
dread of both, met his fate in a foreign land. While 
living in Phrygia he was murdered by the Persian sa- 
trap at the instance of Sparta. It has been said of him 
that, "with qualities w T hich, if properly applied, might 
have rendered him the greatest benefactor of Athens, 
he contrived to attain the infamous distinction of being 
that citizen who had inflicted upon her the most signal 
amount of damage." 

The war just closed was characterized by many in- 
stances of cruelty and heartlessness, in marked contrast 
with the boasted clemency and culture of the age, of 
which two prominent illustrations may be given. The 
first occurred at Platsea in the year 427, soon after the 
execution by the Athenians of the Mitylene'an pris- 
oners. After a long and heroic defence against the 
Spartans under King Archida'mus himself, and after a 
solemn promise had been given that no harm should be 
illegally done to any person within its walls, Platsea sur- 



296 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

rendered. But a Spartan court soon after decreed that 
the Platsean alliance with Athens was a treasonable of- 
fence, and punishable, of course, with death. Thereupon 
all those who had surrendered (two hundred Platseans 
and twenty-five Athenians) were barbarously murdered. 
The other instance occurred at Lamp'sacus, where the 
three thousand prisoners taken by Lysander at ^Egos- 
potami were tried by court-martial and put to death. 

Keferring to these barbarities, Mahaffy observes, in 
his Social Life in Greece, that, " though seldom paral- 
leled in human history, they appear to have called forth 
no cry of horror in Greece. Phil'ocles, the unfortunate 
Athenian general at ^Egospotami, according to Theo- 
phrastus, submitted with dignified resignation to a fate 
which he confessed would have attended the Lacede- 
monians had they been vanquished. 1 The barbarity of 
the Greeks is but one evidence out of a thousand that, 
hitherto in the world's history, no culture, no education, 
no political training, has been able to rival the mature 
and ultimate effects of Christianity in humanizing so- 
ciety." 

CHANGES IN GOVERNMENT AT ATHENS. 

The change of government which followed the Spar- 
tan occupation of Athens conformed to the aristocratic 
character of the Spartan institutions. All authority was 
placed by Lysander in the hands of thirty archons, who 
became known as the Thirty Tyrants, and whose power 
was supported by a Spartan garrison. Their cruelty and 
rapacity knew no bounds, and filled Athens with uni- 

i Plutarch relates that when Lysander asked Philoeles what punish- 
ment he thought he deserved, undismayed by his misfortunes, he an- 
swered "Do not start a question where there is no judge to decide it; 
but, now you are a coiiquerer, proceed as you would have been proceeded 
with had you been conquered." After this he bathed, dressed himself in a 
rich robe, and then led his countrymen to execution, being the first to 
offer his neck to the axe. 



PELOPONNESIAN WARS, AND FALL OF ATHENS. 297 

versal dismay. The streets of Athens flowed with blood, 
and while many of the best men of the city fell, others 
more fortunate succeeded in escaping to the territory of 
the friendly Thebans, who, groaning under Spartan su- 
premacy, sympathized with Athens, and regarded the 
Thirty as mere instruments for maintaining the Spartan 
dominion. A large band of exiles soon assembled, and 
choosing one Thrasybu'lus for their leader, they resolved 
to strike a blow for the deliverance of their country. 

They first seized a small fortress on the frontier of 
Attica, when, their numbers rapidly increasing, they 
were able to seize the Piraeus, where they intrenched 
themselves and defeated the force that was brought 
against them, killing, among others, Cri'ti-as, the chief of 
the tyrants. The loss of Critias threw the majority into 
the hands of a party who resolved to depose the Thirty 
and constitute a new oligarchy of Ten. The rule of the 
Thirty was overthrown ; but the change in government 
was simply a reduction in the number of tyrants, as the 
Ten emulated the wickedness of their predecessors, and 
when the populace turned against them, applied to 
Sparta for assistance. Lysander again entered Athens 
at the head of a large force ; but the Spartan councils 
became divided, Lysander was deposed from command, 
and eventually, by the aid of Sparta herself, the Ten 
were overthrown. The Spartans now withdrew their 
forces from Attica, and Athens again became a democ- 
racy (403 b.c). Freed from foreign domination, she soon 
obtained internal peace ; but her empire had vanished. 

13* 



s 



298 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTER XII. 

GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART, FROM THE BEGINNING 
OF THE PERSIAN TO THE CLOSE OF THE PELOPON- 
NESIAN WARS. (500-403 B.C.) 

LITERATURE. 

In a former chapter we briefly traced the growth of 
Grecian literature and art from their beginnings down 
to. the time of the Persian wars. Within this period, as 
we noticed, their progress was the greatest in the Gre- 
cian colonies, while, of the cities of central Greece, the 
one destined to become pre-eminent in literature and the 
fine arts— Athens— contributed less than several others 
to intellectual advancement. "She produced no ar- 
tists to be compared with those of Argos, Corinth, Si'- 
cy-on, and of many other cities, while she could boast of 
no poets as celebrated as those of the Ionian and iEolian 
schools." But at the opening of the Persian wars the 
artistic and literary talent of Greece began to centre in 
Athens, and with the close of that contest properly be- 
gins the era of Athenian greatness. Athens, hitherto 
inferior in magnitude and political importance, having 
borne the brunt and won the highest martial honor of 
the conflict with Persia, now took the lead, as well in 
intellectual progress as in political ascendency. To this 
era Professor Symonds refers, as follows : 

" It was the struggle with Xerxes which developed all 
the latent energies of the Greeks, which intensified their 
national existence, and which secured for Athens, as the 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 299 

central power on which the scattered forces of the race 
converged, the intellectual dictatorship of Hellas. It 
was a struggle of spiritual energy against brute force, of 
liberty against oppression, of intellectual freedom against, 
superstitious ignorance, of civilization against barbarism ; 
and Athens, who had fought and won this battle of the 
Spirit — by spirit we mean the greatness of the soul, liber- 
ty, intelligence, and everything which raises men above 
brutes and slaves, and makes them free beneath the arch 
of heaven — became immediately the recognized imperson- 
ation of the spirit itself. Whatever was superb in human 
nature found its natural home and sphere in Athens. 
We hear no more of the colonies. All great works of art 
and literature are now produced in Athens, and it is to 
Athens that the sages come to teach and to be taught." ' 



I. LYRIC POETRY. 
SIMON'IDES AND PINDAR. 



The rapid progress made in the cultivation of lyric 
poetry preceding the Persian wars found its culmina- 
tion, during those wars, in Simonides of Ceos, the most 
brilliant period of whose life was spent at Athens; and 
in Pindar, a native of Thebes, who is considered the 
greatest lyric poet of all ages. The life of Simonides 
was a long one, reaching from 556 to 469 b.c. " Com- 
ing forward at a time," says Mahaffy, " when the ty- 
rants had made poetry a matter of culture, and disso- 
ciated it from politics, we find him a professional artist, 
free from all party struggles, alike welcome at the courts 
of tyrants and among the citizens of free states ; he was 
respected throughout all the Greek world, and knew 



1 " The Greek Poets." First Series, p. 19. 



300 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

well how to suit himself, socially and artistically, to his 
patrons. The great national struggle with Persia gave 
him the opportunity of becoming the spokesman of the 
nation in celebrating the glories of the victors and the 
heroism of the fallen patriots ; and this exceptional op- 
portunity made him quite the foremost poet of his day, 
and decidedly better known and more admired than 
Pindar, who has so completely eclipsed him in the at- 
tention of posterity." J 

Simonides was the intimate friend of Miltiades and 
Themistocles at Athens, of Pausanias at Sparta, and of 
the tyrants of Sicily. In the first named city he com- 
posed his epigrams on Marathon, Thermopylae, Salamis, 
and Platsea— " poems not destined to be merely sung or 
consigned to parchment, but to be carved in marble or 
engraved in letters of imperishable bronze upon the 
works of the noblest architects and statuaries." In his 
elegy upon Marathon he carried away the prize from 
^Eschylus. He was a most prolific poet, and his writ- 
ings, comprising all the subjects that human life, with 
its joys and sorrows, its hopes and disappointments, 
could furnish, are noted for their sweetness and pure 
and exquisite polish. He particularly excelled in the 
pathetic ; and the most celebrated of the existing frag- 
ments of his muse, the "Lamentation of Dan'a-e," is a 
piece of this character. The poem is based upon a tra- 
dition concerning Danae, the daughter of Acris'ius, King 
of Argos, and her infant son, the offspring of Jove. 
Acrisius had been told by the oracle that his life would 
be taken by a son that his daughter should bear, and, 
for his own preservation, when the boy had reached the 
ao-e of four years, Acrisius threw both him and his 
mother into a chest and set them adrift on the sea. But 

"Classical Greek Literature," vol. i., p. 307. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 301 

they were rescued by Dictys, a fisherman of the Island 
of Seri'phus, whose brother Polydec'tes, king of the 
country, received and protected them. The boy grew 
up to manhood, and became the famous hero Per'seus, 
who accidentally killed Acrisius at the funeral games of 
Polydectes. The following is the 

Lamentation of Dan'a-e. 

While, around her lone ark sweeping, 

Wailed the winds and waters wild, 
Her young cheeks all wan with weeping, 

Danae clasped her sleeping child ; 
And " Alas !" cried she, " my dearest, 

What deep wrongs, what woes are mine ; 
But nor wrongs nor woes thou fearest 

In that sinless rest of thine. 
Faint the moonbeams break above thee, 

And within here all is gloom ; 
But, fast wrapped in arms that love thee, 

Little reck'st thou of our doom. 
Not the rude spray, round thee flying, 

Has e'en damped thy clustering hair ; 
On thy purple mantlet lying, 

O mine Innocent, my Fair ! 
Yet, to thee were sorrow sorrow, 

Thou wouldst lend thy little ear ; 
And this heart of thine might borrow, 

Haply, yet a moment's cheer. 
But no : slumber on, babe, slumber ; 

Slumber, ocean's waves; and you, 
My dark troubles, without number — 

Oh, that ye would slumber too ! 
Though with wrongs they've brimmed my chalice, 

Grant, Jove, that, in future years, 

This boy may defeat their malice, 

And avenge his mother's tears !" 

Trans, by W. Peter. 



302 .MOSAICS. OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Simonides was nearly eighty years old when he gained 
his last poetical prize at Athens, making the fiftieth that 
he had won. He then retired to Syracuse, at the invita- 
tion of Hi'ero, where he spent the remaining ten years 
of his life. He was a philosopher as well as poet, and 
his wise sayings made him a special favorite with the 
accomplished Hiero. When inquired of by that mon- 
arch concerning the nature of God, Simonides requested 
one day for deliberating on the subject ; and when Hi- 
ero repeated the question the next day, the poet asked 
for two days more. As he still went on doubling the 
number of days, the monarch, lost in wonder, asked 
him why he did so. "Because," replied Simonides, 
" the longer I reflect on the subject, the more obscure 
does it appear to me to be." 

Pindar, the most celebrated of all the lyric poets of 
Greece, was born about 520 b.c. At an early age he 
was sent to Athens to receive instruction in the art of 
poetry: returning to Thebes at twenty, his youthful 
genius was quickened and guided by the influence of 
Myr'tis and Corin'na, two poetesses who then enjoyed 
great celebrity in Bceotia. At a later period "he un- 
doubtedly experienced," says Thiklwall, " the animat- 
ing influence of that joyful and stirring time which fol- 
lowed the defeat of the barbarian invader, though, as a 
Theban patriot, he could not heartily enjoy a triumph 
by which Thebes as well as Persia was humbled." But 
his enthusiasm for Athens, which he calls " the buttress 
of Hellas," is apparent in one of his compositions ; and 
the Athenians specially honored him with a valuable 
present, and, after his death, erected a bronze statue to 
his memory. It is probable, however, that while he was 
sincerely anxious for the success of Greece in the great 
contest, he avoided as much as possible offending his own 
people, whose sympathies and hopes lay the other way. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 303 

The reputation of Pindar early became so great that 
lie was employed, by various states and princes, to com- 
pose choral songs for special occasions. Like Simonides, 
he "loved to bask in the sunshine of courts;" but he 
was frank, sincere, and manly, assuming a lofty and dig- 
nified position toward princes and others in authority 
with whom he came in contact. He was especially 
courted by Hiero, despot of Syracuse, but remained 
with him only a few years, his manly disposition creat- 
ing a love for an independent life that the courtly arts 
of his patron could not furnish. As his poems show, he 
was a reserved man, learned in the myths and ceremo- 
nies of the times, and specially devoted to the worship 
of the gods. " The old myths," says a Greek biogra- 
pher, " were for the most part realities to him, and he 
accepted them with implicit credence, except when they 
exhibited the gods in a point of view which was repug- 
nant to his moral feelings; and he accordingly rejects 
some tales, and changes others, because they are incon- 
sistent with his moral conceptions." As a poet correctly 
describes him, using one of the names commonly ap- 
plied to him, 

Pindar, that eagle, mounts the skies, 

While virtue leads the noble way. . Prior. 

The poems of Pindar were numerous, and comprised 
triumphal odes, hymns to the gods, paeans, dirges, and 
songs of various kinds. His triumphal odes alone have 
come down to us entire ; but of some of his other com- 
positions there are a few sublime and beautiful frag- 
ments. The poet and his writings cannot be better 
described than in the following general characterization 
by Symonds: 

"By the force of his originality Pindar gave lyrical 
poetry a wholly new direction, and, coming last of the 



304: MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY, 

great Dorian lyrists, taught posterity what sort of thing 
an ode should be. His grand pre-eminence as an artist 
was due, in great measure, to his personality. Frigid, 
austere, and splendid ; not genial like that of Simonides, 
not passionate like that of Sappho, not acrid like that 
of Archirochus ; hard as adamant, rigid in moral firm- 
ness, glittering with the strong, keen light of snow; 
haughty, aristocratic, magnificent— the unique personal- 
ity of the man Pindar, so irresistible in its influence, so 
hard to characterize, is felt in every strophe of his odes. 
In his isolation and elevation Pindar stands like some 
fabled heaven - aspiring peak, conspicuous from afar, 
girdled at the base with ice and snow, beaten by winds, 
wreathed round with steam and vapor, jutting a sharp 
and dazzling outline into cold blue ether. Few things 
that have life dare to visit him at his grand altitude. 
Glorious with sunlight and with stars, touched by rise 
and set of day with splendor, he shines when other 
lesser lights are dulled. Pindar among his peers is 
solitary. He had no communion with the poets of his 
day. He is the eagle ; Simonides and Bacchyl'ides are 
jackdaws. He soars to the empyrean; they haunt the 
valley mists. Noticing this rocky, barren, severe, glit- 
tering solitude of Pindar's soul, critics have not unfre- 
quently complained that his poems are devoid of indi- 
vidual interest. Possibly they have failed to compre- 
hend and appreciate the nature of this sublime and dis- 
tant genius, whose character, in truth, is just as marked 
as that of Dante or of Michael Angelo." 

After giving some illustrations of the impression pro- 
duced upon the imagination by a study of Pindar's odes, 
the writer proceeds with his characterization, in the 
following language : " He who has watched a sunset 
attended by the passing of a thunder-storm in the out- 
skirts of the Alps— who has seen the distant ranges of 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 305 

the mountains alternately obscured by cloud and blazing 
with the concentrated brightness of the sinking sun, 
while drifting scuds of hail and rain, tawny with sun- 
light, glistening with broken rainbows, clothe peak and 
precipice and forest in the golden veil of flame - irra- 
diated vapor — he who has heard the thunder bellow 
in the thwarting folds of hills, and watched the light- 
ning, like a snake's tongue, flicker at intervals amid 
gloom and glory — knows, in Nature's language, what 
Pindar teaches with the voice of Art. It is only by a 
metaphor like this that any attempt to realize the Sturm 
and Drang of Pindar's style can be communicated. As 
an artist he combines the strong flight of the eagle, the 
irresistible force of the torrent, the richness of Greek 
wine, and the majestic pageantry of Nature in one of 
her sublimer moods." 1 

Pindar, as we have seen, was compared to an eagle, 
because of the daring flights and lofty character of his 
poetry — a simile which has been beautifully expressed 
in the following lines by Gkay : 

The pride and ample pinion 
That the Theban eagle bare, 
Sailing with supreme dominion 
Through the azure deeps of air. 

Another image, also, has been employed to show these 
features of his poetry. The poet Pope represents him 
riding in a gorgeous chariot sustained by four swans : 

Four swans sustain a car of silver bright, 

With heads advanced and pinions stretched for flight ; 

Here, like some furious prophet, Pindar rode, 

And seemed to labor with th' inspiring god. 

A third image, given to us by Hokace, represents an- 

i " The Greek Poets." First Series, pp. 171, 174. 



806 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

other characteristic of Pindar, which may be called " the 
stormy violence of his song :" 

As when a river, swollen by sudden showers, 

O'er its known banks from some steep mountain pours ; 

So, in profound, unmeasurable song, 

The deep-mouthed Pindar, foaming, pours along. 

Trans, by Francis. 

As a sample of the religious sentiment of Pindar 
we give the following fragment of a threnos translated 
by Me. Symonds, which, he says, "sounds like a trum- 
pet blast for immortality, and, trampling underfoot the 
glories of this world, reveals the gladness of the souls 
that have attained Elysium :" 

For them, the night all through, 

In that broad realm below, 
The splendor of the sun spreads endless light ; 

'Mid rosy meadows bright, 
Their city of the tombs, with incense- trees 

And golden chalices 

Of flowers, and fruitage fair, 

Scenting the breezy air, 
Is laden. There, with horses and with play, 
With games and lyres, they while the hours away. 

On every side around 

Pure happiness is found, 
With all the blooming beauty of the world ; 

There fragrant smoke, upcurled 
From altars where the blazing fire is dense 

With perfumed frankincense, 

Burned unto gods in heaven, 

Through all the land is driven, 
Making its pleasant place odorous 
With scented gales, and sweet airs amorous. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 307 



II. THE DRAMA. 

One of the most striking proofs that we possess of 
the rapid growth and expansion of the Greek mind, is 
found in the rise of the Drama, a new kind of poetical 
composition, which united the leading features of every 
species before cultivated, in a new whole "breathing 
a rhetorical, dialectical, and ethical spirit" — a branch 
of literature that peculiarly characterized the era of 
Athenian greatness. Its elements were found in the 
religious festivals celebrated in Greece from the earliest 
ages, and especially in the feast of Bacchus, where sa- 
cred odes of a grave and serious character, intermixed 
with episodes of mythological story recited by an actor, 
were sung by a chorus that danced around the altar. A 
goat was either the principal sacrifice on these occasions, 
or the participants, disguised as Satyrs, had a goat-like 
appearance ; and from the two Greek words represent- 
ing "goat" and "song" we get our word tragedy} or 
goat-song. At some of the more rustic festivals in honor 
of the same god the performance was of a more jocose 
or satirical character ; and hence arose the term comedy} 
from the two Greek words signifying "village" and 
"song" — village - song. In the teller of mythological 
legends we find the first germ of dialogue, as the chorus 
soon came to assist him by occasional question and re- 
mark. This feature was introduced by Thespis, a na- 
tive of Ica'ria, in 535 B.C., under whose direction, and 
that of Phryn'icus, his pupil, the first feeble rudiments 
of the drama were established. In this condition it was 
found by ^Eschylus, in 500 B.C., who brought a second 
actor upon the scene ; whence arose the increased prom- 
inence of the dialogue, and the limitation and subsidi- 

1 From the Greek trar/os, "a goat," and o'de, "a song." 

2 From tho Greek ko'me," a village," and o'de, " a song." 



308 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ary character of the chorus. ^schylus also added more 
expressive masks, and various machinery and scenes cal- 
culated to improve and enlarge dramatic representation. 
Of the effect of this new creation upon all kinds of 
poetical genius we have the following fine illustration 
from the pen of Bulwer : 

"It was in the very nature of the Athenian drama 
that, when once established, it should concentrate and 
absorb almost every variety of poetical genius. The 
old lyrical poetry, never much cultivated in Athens, 
ceased in a great measure when tragedy arose ; or, rath- 
er, tragedy was the complete development, the new and 
perfected consummation, of the dithyrambic ode. Lyr- 
ical poetry transmigrated into the choral song as the 
epic merged into the dialogue and plot of the drama. 
Thus, when we speak of Athenian poetry we speak of 
dramatic poetry — they were one and the same. In 
Athens, where audiences were numerous and readers 
few, every man who felt within himself the inspiration 
of the poet would necessarily desire to see his poetry 
put into action— assisted with all the pomp of spectacle 
and music, hallowed by the solemnity of a religious fes- 
tival, and breathed by artists elaborately trained to 
heighten the eloquence of words into the reverent ear 
of assembled Greece. Hence the multitude of dramatic 
poets ; hence the mighty fertility of each ; hence the 
life and activity of this— the comparative torpor and 
barrenness of every other— species of poetry." 

1. Tragedy. 

Melpom'ene, one of the nine Muses, whose name sig- 
nifies " To represent in song," is said to have been the 
inventress of tragedy, over which she presided, always 
veiled, bearing in one hand the lyre, as the emblem of 
her vocation, and in the other a tragic mask. As queen 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 309 

of the lyre, every poet was supposed to proclaim the 
marvels of her song, and to invoke her aid. 

Qneen of the lyre, in thy retreat 
The fairest flowers of Pindus glow, 
The vine aspires to crown thy seat, 
And myrtles round thy laurel grow : 
Thy strings adapt their varied strain 
To every pleasure, every pain, 
Which mortal tribes were born to prove ; 
And straight our passions rise or fall, 
As, at the wind's imperious call, 
The ocean swells, the billows move. 

When midnight listens o'er the slumbering earth, 

Let me, O Muse, thy solemn whispers hear : 

When morning sends her fragrant breezes forth, 

With airy murmurs touch my opening ear. 

Akenside. 

^eschylus. 

^Eschylus, the first poet who rendered the drama illus- 
trious, and into whose character and writings the severe 
and ascetic doctrines of Pythagoras entered largely, was 
born at Eleu'sis, in Attica, in 525 b.c. He fought, as 
will be remembered, in the combats of Marathon and 
Salamis, and also in the battle of Plateea. He therefore 
flourished at the time when the freedom of Greece, res- 
cued from foreign enemies, was exulting in its first 
strength ; and his writings are characteristic of the bold- 
ness and vio;or of the ao;e. In his works we find the 
fundamental idea of the Greek drama — retributive jus- 
tice. The sterner passions alone are appealed to, and the 
language is replete with bold metaphor and gigantic 
hyperbole. Venus and her inspirations are excluded ; 
the charms of love are unknown : but the gods — vast, 
majestic, in shadowy outline, and in the awful sublimity 



310 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

of power — pass before and awe the beholder. 1 Says a 
prominent reviewer : " The conceptions of the imagina- 
tion of iEschylus are remarkable for a sort of colossal 
sublimity and power, resembling the poetry of the Book 
of Job ; and those poems of his which embody a con- 
nected story may be said to resemble the stupendous 
avenues of the Temple of Elora, 2 with the vast scenes and 
vistas; its strange, daring, though rude sculptures; its 
awful, shadowy, impending horrors. Like the architect- 
ure, the poems, too, seem hewn out of some massy re- 
gion of mountain rock. iEschylus appears as an au- 
stere poet-soul, brooding among the grand, awful, and 
terrible myths which have floated from a primeval 
world, in which traditions of the Deluge, of the early 
rudimental struggle between barbaric power and nas- 
cent civilization, were still vital." 

"The personal temperament of the man," says Dr. 
Pltjmptre, 3 " seems to have been in harmony with the 
characteristics of his genius. Vehement, passionate, iras- 
cible; writing his tragedies, as later critics judged, as if 
half drunk; doing (as Sophocles said of him) what was 
right in his art without knowing why; following the 
impulses that led him to strange themes and dark prob- 
lems, rather than aiming at the perfection of a complete, 
all-sided culture ; frowning with shaggy brows, like a 
wild bull, glaring fiercely, and bursting into a storm of 
wrath when annoyed by critics or rival poets ; a Mar- 
lowe rather than a Shakspeare: this is the portrait 
sketched by one who must have painted a figure still 
fresh in the minds of the Athenians. 4 Such a man, both 
by birth and disposition, was likely to attach himself to 
the aristocratic party, and to look with scorn on the 

i See Grote's "History of Greece," Chap. Ixvii. 2 See Index. 

3 « The Tragedies of ^Eschylus," by E. H. Plumptre, D.D. 
* Aristophanes, in The Frogs. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 311 

claims of the demos to a larger share of power; and 
there is hardly a play in which some political bias in 
that direction may not be traced." 

^Eschylns wrote his plays in trilogies, or three suc- 
cessive dramas connected. Of the eighty tragedies that 
he wrote, only seven have been preserved. From three 
of these, The Persians, Prome 'theus, and Agamemnon, 
we have given extracts descriptive of historical and 
mythological events. The latter is the first of three 
plays on the fortunes of the house of A'treus, of My- 
ce'nse ; and these three, of which the Choeph'orce and 
Eumenides are the other two, are the only extant speci- 
men of a trilogy. The Agamemnon is the longest, and 
by some considered the grandest, play left us by iEschy- 
lus. "In the Agamemnon? says Von Schlegel, "it 
was the intention of ^Eschylus to exhibit to us a sudden 
fall from the highest pinnacle of prosperity and renown 
into the abyss of ruin. The prince, the hero, the gen- 
eral of the combined forces of the Greeks, in the very 
moment of success and the glorious achievement of the 
destruction of Troj', the fame of which is to be re-echoed 
from the mouths of the greatest poets of all ages, in the 
very act of crossing the threshold of his home, after 
which he had so long sighed, and amidst the fearless 
security of preparations for a festival, is butchered, ac- 
cording to the expression of Homer, 'like'an ox in the 
stall,' slain by his faithless wife, his throne usurped by 
her worthless seducer, and his children consigned to 
banishment or to hopeless servitude." 1 

Among the fine passages of this play, the death of 
Agamemnon, at the hand of Clytemnes'tra, is a scene 
that the poet paints with terrible effect. Says Me. Eu- 



i "Lectures on Dramatic Art and Literature," by Augustus William 
Von Schlegel. Black's translation. 



312 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

gene Lawrence, 1 " Mr. E. C. Stedman's version of the 
death of Agamemnon is an excellent one. A horror 
rests upon the palace at Mycenae ; there is a scent of 
blood, the exhalations of the tomb. The queen, Cly- 
temnestra, enters the inner room, terrible as Lady Mac- 
beth. A cry is heard : 

" ' Agam. Woe's me ! I'm stricken a deadly blow within 1' 
" « Chor. Hark ! who is't cries " a blow ?" Who meets his 

death V 

" l Agam. Woe's me! Again! again! a second time Ira 

stricken !' 

"'Char. The deed, methinks, from the king's cry, is done. 

At length the queen appears, standing at her full height, 
terrible, holding her bloody weapon in her hand. She 
seeks no concealment. She proclaims her guilt : 

" « I smote him ! nor deny that thus I did it ; 
So that he could not flee or ward off doom. 
A seamless net, as round a fish, I cast 
About him, yea, a deadly wealth of robe, 
Then smote him twice ; and with a double cry 
He loosed his limbs ; and to him fallen I gave 
Yet a third thrust, a grace to Hades, lord 
Of the under-world and guardian of the dead.' 

But the most finished of the tragedies of ^Eschylus is 
Choephorce, which is made the subject of the revenge of 
Ores' tes, son of Agamemnon, who avenges the murder 
of his father by putting his mother to death. For this 
crime the Eumenides represents him as being driven 
insane by the Furies ; but his reason was subsequently 
restored. It is the chief object of the poet, in this trag- 
edy, to display the distress of Orestes at the necessity he 

i « A Primer of Greek Literature," by Eugene Lawrence, p. 55. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 313 

feels of avenging his father's death upon his mother. 
To this Byron refers in Childe Harold: 

O thou ! who never yet of human wrong 
Left the unbalanced scale — great Nem'esis ! 
Thou who didst call the Furies from the abyss, 
And round Orestes bade them howl and hiss 
For that unnatural retribution — just, 
Had it but been from hands less near — in this, 
Thy former realm, I call thee from the dust ! 

At the close of an interesting characterization of 
^Eschylus and his works — much too long for a full 
quotation here — Professor Mahaffy observes as fol- 
lows : 

" We always feel that JEschylus thought more than 
he expressed, that his desperate compounds are never 
affected or unnecessary. Although, therefore, he vio- 
lated the rules that bound weaker men, it is false to say 
that be was less an artist than they. His art was of a 
different kind, despising what they prized, and attempt- 
ing what they did not dare, but not the less a conscious 
and thorough art. Though the drawing of character 
was not his main object, his characters are truer and 
deeper than those of poets who attempted nothing else. 
Though lyrical sweetness had little place in the gloom 
and terror of his Titanic stage, yet here too, when he 
chooses, he equals the masters of lyric song. So long as 
a single Homer was deemed the author of the Iliad and 
the Odysseij, we might well concede to him the first 
place, and say that iEschylus was the second poet of the 
Greeks. But by the light of nearer criticism, and with 
a closer insight into the structure of the epic poems, we 
must retract this judgment, and assert that no other poet 
among the Greeks, either in grandeur of conception or 

14 



314 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

splendor of execution, equals the untranslatable, unap- 
proachable, inimitable JEschylus." 1 

SOPHOCLES. 

iEschylus was succeeded, as master of the drama, by 
Sophocles— the Rafiaelle of the drama, as Bulwer calls 
hi m — w ho was also one of the generals of the Atheni- 
an expedition against Samos in the year 440 b.c. He 
brought the drama to the greatest perfection of which 
it was susceptible. In him we find a greater range of 
emotions than in iEschylus — figures more distinctly 
seen, a more expanded dialogue, simplicity of speech 
mixed with rhetorical declamation, and the highest de- 
gree of poetic beauty. Says a late writer : u The artist 
and the man were one in Sophocles. We cannot but 
think of him as specially created to represent Greek 
art in its most refined and exquisitely balanced perfec- 
tion. It is impossible to imagine a more plastic nature, 
a genius more adapted to its special function, more fit- 
tingly provided with all things needful to its full de- 
velopment, born at a happier moment in the history of 
the world, and more nobly endowed with physical qual- 
ities suited to its intellectual capacity." 

Sophocles composed one hundred and thirteen plays, 
but only seven of them are extant. Of these the most 
familiar is the tragedy of (Ed'ipus Tyran / nus—"King 
GEdipus." It is not only considered his masterpiece, 
but also, as regards the choice and disposition of the 
fable on which it is founded, the finest tragedy of an- 
tiquity. A new interest has been given to it in this 
country by its recent representation in the original 
Greek. Of its many translations, it is conceded that 
none have done, and none can do it justice; they can 



» " Classical Greek Literature," vol. i., p. 275. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 315 

do little more than give its plan and general character. 
The following, in brief, is the story of this famous 
tragedy : 

(Edipus Tyrannus. 

La'i-us, King of Thebes, was told by the Delphic ora- 
cle that if a son should be born to him, by the hand of 
that son he should surely die. When, therefore, his 
queen, Jocasta, bare him a son, the parents gave the 
child to a shepherd, with orders to cast it out, bound, 
on the hill Cithse'ron to perish. But the shepherd, 
moved to compassion, deceived the parents, and intrust- 
ed the babe to a herdsman of Porybus, King of Corinth ; 
and the wife of Polybus, being childless, named the 
foundling (Edipus, and reared it as her own. 

Thirty years later, (Edipus, ignorant of his birth, and 
being directed by the oracle to shun his native country, 
fled from Corinth; and it happened at the same time 
that his father (Laius) was on his way to consult the 
oracle at Delphi, for the purpose of ascertaining whether 
the child that had been exposed had perished or not. 
As father and son, strangers to each other, met in a 
narrow path in the mountains, a dispute arose for the 
right of way, and in the contest that ensued the father 
was slain. 

Immediately after this event the goddess Juno, al- 
ways hostile to Thebes, sent a monster, called the sphinx, 
to propound a riddle to the Thebans, and to ravage their 
territory until some one should solve the riddle— the 
purport of which was, " What animal is that which goes 
on four feet in the morning, on two at noon, and on 
three at evening?" (Edipus, the supposed son of Poly- 
bus, of Corinth, coming to Thebes, solved the riddle, by 
answering the sphinx that it was man, who, when an 
infant, creeps on all fours, in manhood goes on two 
feet, and when old uses a staff. The sphinx then threw 



316 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

herself down to the earth and perished ; whereupon the 
Thebans, in their joy, chose (Edipus as king, and he 
married the widowed queen Jocasta, by whom he had 
two sons and two daughters. Although everything 
prospered with him— as he loved the Theban people, 
and was beloved by them in turn for his many virtues- 
soon the wrath of the gods fell upon the city, which 
was visited by a sore pestilence. Creon, brother of the 
queen, is now sent to consult the oracle for the cause of 
the evil ; and it is at the point of his return that the 
drama opens. He brings back the response 

"That guilt of blood is blasting all the state;" 

that this guilt is connected with the death of Laius, and 

that " . _ 

" Now the god clearly bids us, he being dead, 

To take revenge on those who shed his blood." 

(Edipus engages earnestly in the business of unravel- 
ling the mystery connected with the death of Laius, the 
cause of all the Theban woes. Ignorant that he himself 
bears the load of guilt, he charges the Thebans to be 
vigilant and unremitting in their efforts,— 

" And for the man who did the guilty deed, 
Whether alone he lurks, or leagued with more, 
I pray that he may waste his life away, 
For vile deeds vilely dying ; and for me, 
If in my house, I knowing it, he dwells, 
May every curse I spake on my head fall." 

A blind and aged priest and prophet, Tire'sias, is 
brought before (Edipus, and, being implored to lend 
the aid of prophecy- to "save the city from the curse" 
that had fallen on it, he at first refuses to exert his 
prophetic power. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 317 

Tiresias. Ah ! Reason fails you all, but ne'er will I 
Say what thou bidd'st, lest I thy troubles show. 
I will not pain myself nor thee. Why, then, 
All vainly question ? Thou shalt never know. 

But, urged and threatened by the king, he at length 
exclaims : 

Tier. And has it come to this? I charge thee, hold 
To thy late edict, and from this day forth 
Speak not to me, nor yet to these, for thou — 
Thou art the accursed plague-spot of the land ! 

(Edipns at first believes that the aged prophet is 
merely the tool of others, who are engaged in a con- 
spiracy to expel him from the throne ; but when Jocasta, 
in her innocence, informs him of the death of Laius, 
names the mountain pass in which he fell, slain, as was 
supposed, by a robber band, and describes his dress and 
person, (Edipus is startled at the thought that he him- 
self was the slayer, and he exclaims, 

" Great Zeus ! what fate hast thou decreed for me ? 
Woe ! woe ! 'tis all too clear." 

Yet there is one hope left. The man whom he slew 
in that same mountain pass fell by no robber band, and, 
therefore, could not have been Laius. Soon even this 
hope deserts him, when the story is truly told. He 
learns, moreover, that he is not the son of Poly bus, the 
Corinthian king, but a foundling adopted by his queen. 
Connecting this with the story now told him by Jocasta, 
of her infant son, whom she supposed to have perished 
on the mountain, the horrid truth begins to dawn upon 
all. Jocasta rushes from the presence of (Edipus, ex- 
claiming, 

" Woe ! woe ! ill-fated one ! my last word this, 
This only, aud no more for evermore." 



318 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

When the old shepherd, forced to declare the truth, 
tells how he saved the life of the infant, and gave it into 
the keeping of the herdsman of Polybus, the evil-starred 
(Edipus exclaims, in agony of spirit : 

" Woe ! woe ! woe ! all cometh clear at last. 

O light ! may this my last glance he on thee, 

Who now am seen owing my birth to those 

To whom I ought not, and with whom I ought not 

In wedlock living, whom I ought not slaying." 

Horrors still thicken in this terrible tragedy. Word 
is brought to (Edipus that Jocasta is dead — dead by her 
own hand ! He rushes in : 

Then came a sight 
Most fearful. Tearing from her robe the clasps, 
All chased with gold, with which she decked herself, 
He with them struck the pupils of his eyes, 
With words like these — " Because they had not seen 
What ills he suffered and what ills he did, 
They in the dark should look, in time to come, 
On those whom they ought never to have seen, 
Nor know the dear ones whom he fain had known." 
With such-like wails, not once or twice alone, 
Raising his eyes, he smote them ; and the balls, 
All bleeding, stained his cheek, nor poured they forth 
Gore drops slow trickling, but the purple shower 
Fell fast and full, a pelting storm of blood. 

The now blind and wretched (Edipus, bewailing his 
fate and the evils he had so unwittingly brought upon 
Thebes, begs to be cast forth with all speed from out 
the land. 

(Edijms. Lead me away, my friends, with utmost speed 
Lead me away ; the foul, polluted one, 
Of all men most accursed, 
Most hateful to the gods. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 319 

Chorus. Ah, wretched one, alike in so nl and doom, 

I fain could wish that I had never known thee. 
QEdifms. Ill fate be his who from the fetters freed 

The child upon the hills, 
And rescued me from death, 

And saved me — thankless boon ! 
Ah ! had I died but then, 
Nor to my friends nor me had been such woe. 

A touching picture is presented in the farewell of 
(Edipus, on departing from Thebes to wander an out- 
cast upon the earth. The tragedy concludes with the 
following moral by the chorus : 

Chorus. Ye men of Thebes, behold this (Edipus, 
Who knew the famous riddle, and was noblest. 
Whose fortune who saw not with envious glances ? 
And lo ! in what a sea of direst trouble 
He now is plunged ! From hence the lesson learn ye, 
To reckon no man happy till ye witness 
The closing day ; until he pass the border 
Which severs life from death unscathed by sorrow. 

Trans, by E. H. Pltjmptre. 

Character of the Works of Sophocles. 

The character of the works of Sophocles is well de- 
scribed in the following extract from an Essay on Greek 
Poetry, by Thomas Noon Talfourd : " The great and 
distinguishing excellence of Sophocles will be found in 
his excellent sense of the beautiful, and the perfect har- 
mony of all his powers. His conceptions are not on so 
gigantic a scale as those of iEschylus ; but in the circle 
which he prescribes to himself to fill, not a place is left 
unadorned ; not a niche without its appropriate figure ; 
not the smallest ornament which is incomplete in the 
minutest graces. His judgment seems absolutely per- 



320 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

feet, for he never fails ; he is always fully master of him- 
self and his subject; he knows the precise measure of 
his own capacities ; and while he never attempts a flight 
beyond his reach, he never debases himself nor his art 
by anything beneath him. 

"Sophocles was undoubtedly the first philosophical 
poet of the ancient world. With his pure taste for the 
graceful he perceived, amidst the sensible forms around 
him, one universal spirit of love pervading all things. 
Virtue and justice, to his mind, did not appear the mere 
creatures of convenience, or the means of gratifying the 
refined selfishness of man; he saw them, having deep 
root in eternity, unchanging and imperishable as their 
divine author. In a single stanza he has impressed this 
sentiment with a plenitude of inspiration before which 
the philosophy of expediency vanishes — a passage that 
has neither a parallel nor equal of its kind, that we rec- 
ollect, in the whole compass of heathen poetry, and 
which may be rendered thus: ' Oh for a spotless purity 
of action and of speech, according to those sublime laws 
of right which have the heavens for their birthplace, 
and God alone for their author — which the decays of 
mortal nature cannot vary, nor time cover with oblivion, 
for the divinity is mighty within them and waxes not 
old!'" 

Sophocles died in extreme old age, " without disease 
and without suffering, and was mourned with such a 
sincerity and depth of grief as were exhibited at the 
death of no other citizen of Athens." 

Thrice happy Sophocles ! in good old age, 

Blessed as a man, and as a craftsman blessed, 

He died : his many tragedies were fair, 

And fair his end, nor knew he any sorrow. 

Phryn'ichus. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 321 

Wind, gentle evergreen, to form a shade 
Around the tomb where Sophocles is laid ; 
Sweet ivy wind thy boughs, and intertwine 
With blushing roses and the clustering vine. 
Thus will thy lasting leaves, with beauties hung, 
Prove grateful emblems of the lays he sung, 
Whose soul, exalted by the god of wit, 
Among the Muses and the Graces writ, 

Sim'mias, the Theban. 

EURIPIDES. 

Contemporary with Sophocles was Euripides, born in 
480 b.c, the last of the three great masters of the drama 
—the three being embraced within the limits of a sin- 
gle century. Under Sophocles the principal changes 
effected in the outward form of the drama were the in- 
troduction of a third actor, and a consequent limitation 
of the functions of the chorus. Euripides, however, 
changed the mode of handling tragedy. Unlike Sopho- 
cles, who only limited the activity of the chorus, he 
disconnected it from the tragic interest of the drama 
by giving but little attention to the character of its 
songs. He also made some other changes ; and, as one 
writer expresses it, his innovations "disintegrated the 
drama by destroying its artistic unity." -But although 
perhaps inferior, in an artistic point of view, to his pred- 
ecessors, the genius of Euripides supplied a want that 
they did not meet. Although his plays are all connect- 
ed with the history and mythology of Greece, in them 
rhetoric is more prominent than in the plays of either 
^Eschylus or Sophocles; the legendary characters as- 
sume more the garb of humanity ; the tender sentiments 
—love, pity, compassion— are invoked to a greater de-. 
gree, and an air of exquisite delicacy and refinement 
embellishes the whole. These were the qualities in the 

14* 



322 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

plays of Euripides that endeared him to the Greeks of 
succeeding ages, and that gave to his works such an in- 
fluence on the Eoman and modern drama. 

Of Euripides Mr. Stmonds remarks: "His lasting 
title to fame consists in his having dealt with the 
deeper problems of life in a spirit which became 
permanent among the Greeks, so that his poems never 
lost their value as expressions of current philosophy. 
Nothing strikes the student of later Greek literature 
more strongly than this prolongation of the Eurip- 
idean tone of thought and feeling. In the decline of 
tragic poetry the literary sceptre was transferred to 
comedy ; and the comic playwrights may be described 
as the true successors of Euripides. The dialectic meth- 
od, which he affected, was indeed dropped, and a more 
harmonious form of art than the Euripidean was created 
for comedy by Menan'der, when the Athenians, after 
passing through their disputatious period, had settled 
down into a tranquil acceptation of the facts of life. 
Yet this return to harmony of form and purity of per- 
ception did not abate the influence of Euripides. Here 
and there throughout his tragedies he had said, and well 
said, what the Greeks were bound to think and feel 
upon important matters ; and his sensitive, susceptible 
temperament repeated itself over and over again among 
his literary successors. The exclamation of Phile'mon 
that, if lie" could believe in immortality, he would hang 
himself to see Euripides, is characteristic not only of 
Philemon, but also of the whole Macedonian period of 

Greek literature." 1 

Euripides wrote about seventy -five plays, of which 
eighteen have come down to us. The Me-de'a, which is 
thought to be his best piece, is occupied with the cir- 



i "The Greek Poets." Second Series, p. 300. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 323 

cumstances of the vengeance' taken by Medea on the 
ungrateful Jason, the hero of the Argonautic expedition, 
for whom she had sacrificed all, and who, after his re- 
turn, abandoned her for a royal Corinthian bride. 1 But 
the most touching of the plays of Euripides is the Al- 
ces'tis, founded on the fable of Alcestis dying for her 
husband, Adme'tus. Milton thus alludes to the story, 
in his sonnet on his deceased wife : 

Methought I saw my late espoused saint 

Brought to me, like Alcestis, from the grave, 
"Whom Jove's great son to her glad husband gave, 

Rescued from death by force, though pale and faint. 

The substance of the story is as follows: 

Admetus, King of Phe'rge, in Thessaly, married Al- 
cestis, who became noted for her conjugal virtues. 
Apollo, when banished from heaven, received so kind 
treatment from Admetus that he induced the Fates to 
prolong the latter's life beyond the ordinary limit, on 
condition that one of his own family should die in his 
stead. Alcestis at once consented to die for her hus- 
band, and when the appointed time came she heroi- 
cally and composedly gave herself to death. Soon 
after her departure, however, the hero Hercules visited 
Admetus, and, pained with the profound grief of the 
household, he rescued Alcestis from the grim tyrant 
Death and restored her to her family. The whole play 
abounds in touching scenes and descriptions; and the 
best modern critics concede that there is no female char- 
acter in either iEschylus or Sophocles, not even except- 
ing Antig'one, that is so great and noble, and at the 
same time so purely tender and womanly, as Alcestis. 
"Where has either Greek or modern literature," says 



See Argonautic Expedition, p. 81. 



324 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Mahaffy, "produced a nobler ideal than the Alcestis 
of Euripides? Devoted to her husband and children, 
beloved and happy in her palace, she sacrifices her life 
calmly and resignedly — a life which is not encompassed 
with afflictions, but of all the worth that life can be, 
and of all the usefulness which makes it precious to 
noble natures." 1 We give the following short extract 
from the poet's account of the preparations made by 
Alcestis for her approaching end : 

Alcestis Preparing for Death. 

When she knew 
The destined day was come, in fountain water 
She bathed her lily-tinctured limbs, then took 
From her rich chests, of odorous cedar formed, 
A splendid robe, and her most radiant dress. 
Thus gorgeously arrayed, she stood before 
The hallowed flames, and thus addressed her prayer : 
"O queen, I go to the infernal shades; 
Yet, ere I go, with reverence let me breathe 
My last request : protect my orphan children ; 
Make my son happy with the wife he loves, 
And wed my daughter to a noble husband ; 
Nor let them, like their mother, to the tomb 
Untimely sink, but in their native land 
Be blessed through lengthened life to honored age." 

Then to each altar in the royal house 

She went, and crowned it, and addressed her vows, 

Plucking the myrtle bough : nor tear, nor sigh 

Came from her ; neither did the approaching ill 

Change the fresh beauties of her vermeil cheek. 

Her chamber then she visits, and her bed ; 

There her tears flowed, and thus she spoke : " O bed 



i " Social Life in Greece," p. 189. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 325 

To which my wedded lord, for whom I die, 

Led me a virgin bride, farewell ! to thee 

No blame do I impute, for me alone 

Hast thoa destroyed : disdaining to betray 

Thee, and my lord, I die : to thee shall come 

Some other woman, not more chaste, perchance 

More happy." As she lay she kissed the couch, 

And bathed it with a flood of tears : that passed, 

She left her chamber, then returned, and oft 

She left it, oft returned, and on the couch 

Fondly, each time she entered, cast herself. 

Her children, as they hung upon her robes, 

Weeping, she raised, and clasped them to her breast 

Each after each, as now about to die. 

Trans, by Potter. 

Euripides died in the year 406 b.c., in Macedon, to 
which country he had been compelled to go on account 
of domestic troubles; and the then king, Archela'us, 
honored his remains with a sumptuous funeral, and 
erected a monument over them. 

Divine Euripides, this tomb we see 
So fair is not a monument for thee, 
So much as thou for it ; since all will own 
That thy immortal fame adorns the stone. 

We have now observed the transitions through which 
Grecian tragedy passed in the hands of its three great 
masters, iEschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. As Grote 
says, "The differences between these three poets are 
doubtless referable to the working of Athenian politics 
and Athenian philosophy on the minds of the two lat- 
ter. In Sophocles we may trace the companion of 
Herodotus; in Euripides the hearer of Anaxag'oras, 
Socrates, and Prod'icus; in both, the familiarity with 
that wide-spread popularity of speech, and real, serious 



326 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

debate of politicians and competitors before the dikas- 
tery, which both had ever before their eyes, but which 
the genius of Sophocles knew how to keep in subordina- 
tion to his grand poetical purpose." To properly esti- 
mate the influence which the tragedies exerted upon the 
Athenians, we must remember that a large number of 
them was presented on the stage every year ; that it was 
rare to repeat any one of them ; that the theatre of 
Bacchus, in which they were represented, accommodat- 
ed thirty thousand persons; that, as religious obser- 
vances, they formed part of the civil establishment ; and 
that admission to them was virtually free to every 
Athenian citizen. Taking these things into considera- 
tion, Grote adds : " If we conceive of the entire popu- 
lation of a large city listening almost daily to those im- 
mortal compositions whose beauty first stamped tragedy 
as a separate department of poetry, we shall be satisfied 
that such powerful poetic influences were never brought 
to act upon any other people ; and that the tastes, the sen- 
timents, and the intellectual standard of the Athenians 
must have been sensibly improved and exalted by such 

lessons." * • 

2. Comedy. 

Another marked feature of Athenian life, and one 
but little less influential than tragedy in its effects upon 
the Athenian character, was comedy. It had its origin, 
as we have seen, in the vintage festivals of Bacchus, 
where the wild songs of the participants were frequently 
interspersed with coarse witticisms against the specta- 
tors. Like tragedy, it was a Dorian invention, and Sic- 
ily seems to have early become the seat of the comic 
writers. Epichar'mus, a Dorian poet and philosopher, 
was the first of these to put the Bacchic songs and dances 

i " History of Greece," Chap, lxvii. 



GKECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 327 

into dramatic form. The place of his nativity is uncer- 
tain, but he passed the greater part of his life at Syra- 
cuse, in the society of the greatest literary men of the 
age, and there he is supposed to have written his come- 
dies some years prior to the Persian war. It seems, how- 
ever, that comedy was introduced into Attica by Susa'- 
rion, a native of Meg'ara, long before the time of Epi- 
char'mus (578 b.c). But the former's plays were so 
largely made up of rude and abusive personalities that 
they were not tolerated by the Pisistrati'dse, and for 
over a century we hear nothing farther of comedy in 
Attica— not until it was revived by Chion'ides, about 
488 b.c, or, according to some authorities, twenty years 
later. 

Under the contemporaries or successors of Chionides 
comedy became an important agent in the political war- 
fare of Athens, although it was frequently the subject 
of prohibitory or restrictive legal enactments. " Only a 
nation," says a recent writer, "in the plenitude of self- 
contentment, conscious of vigor, and satisfied with its 
own energy, could have tolerated the kind of censorship 
the comic poets dared to exercise." 

Characterization of the Old Comedy. 

In the preliminary discourse to his translation of the 
Comedies of Aristophanes, Mr. Thomas Mitchell, an 
English critic of note, makes these observations upon 
the character of the Old Comedy : « The Old Comedy, 
as it is called, in contradistinction to what was afterward 
named the Middle and the New, stood in the extreme 
relation of contrariety and parody to the tragedy of the 
Greeks — it was directed chiefly to the lower orders of 
society at Athens; it served in some measure the pur- 
poses of the modern journal, in which public measures 
and the topics of the day might be fully discussed ; and 



328 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

in consequence the dramatis personal were generally the 
poet's own contemporaries, speaking in their own names 
and acting in masks, which, as they bore only a carica- 
ture resemblance of their own faces, showed that the 
poet, in his observations, did not mean to be taken liter- 
ally. Like tragedy, comedy constituted part of a relig- 
ious ceremony ; and the character of the deity to whom 
it was more particularly dedicated was stamped at times 
pretty visibly upon the work which was composed in his 
honor. The Dionysian festivals were the great carnivals 
of antiquity — they celebrated the returns of vernal fes- 
tivity or the joyous vintage, and were in consequence 
the great holidays of Athens— the seasons of universal 
relaxation. 

" The comic poet was the high-priest of the festival ; 
and if the orgies of his divinity (the god of wine) some- 
times demanded a style of poetry which a Father of our 
Church probably had in his eye when he called all poe- 
try the devil's wine, the organ of their utterance (how- 
ever strange it may seem to us) no doubt considered 
himself as perfectly absolved from the censure which 
we should bestow on such productions: in his composi- 
tions he was discharging the same pious office as the 
painter, whose duty it was to fill the temples of the 
same deity with pictures which our imaginations would 
consider equally ill-suited to the habitations of divinity. 
What religion therefore forbids among us, the religion 
of the Greeks did not merely tolerate but enjoin. Nor 
was the extreme and even profane gayety of the comedy 
without its excuse. To unite extravagant mirth with a 
solemn seriousness was enjoined by law, even in the sa- 
cred festival of Ceres. 

" While the philosophers, therefore, querulously main- 
tained that man was the joke and plaything of the gods, 
the comic poet reversed the picture, and made the gods 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 329 

the playthings of men ; in his hands, indeed, every- 
thing was upon the broad grin : the gods laughed, men 
laughed, and animals laughed. Nature was considered 
as a sort of fantastic being, with a turn for the humor- 
ous ; and the world was treated as a sort of extended 
jest-book, where the poet pointed out the bon-mots 1 and 
acted in some degree as corrector of the Press. If he 
discharged this office sometimes in the sarcastic spirit of 
a Mephistopheles, this, too, was considered as part of his 
functions. He was the Ter'rm Fil'ius* of the day; and 
lenity would have been considered, not as an act of dis- 
cretion, but as a cowardly dereliction of duty." 

It was in the time of Pericles that the comedy just 
described first dealt with men and subjects under their 
real names ; and in one of the plays of Crati'nus— under 
whom comedy received its full development— Ciraon is 
highly eulogized, and his rival, Pericles, is bitterly de- 
rided. With unmeasured and unsparing license comedy 
attacked, under the veil of satire, not only all that was 
really ludicrous or base, but often cast scorn and deri- 
sion on that which was innocent, or even meritorious. 
For the reason that the comic writers were so indiscrim- 
inate in their attacks, frequently making transcendent 
genius and noble personality, as well as demagogism and 
personal vice, the butt of comic scorn, their writings 
have but little historical value except in the few in- 
stances in which they are corroborated by higher au- 
thority. 

ARISTOPH'ANES. 

Among the contemporaries of Cratinus were Eu'polis 
and Aristophanes, the latter of whom became the chief 
of what is known as the Old Attic Comedy. Of his life 

1 French ; pronounced hong-mos. 

2 Terra* Filius, son of the earth ; that is, a human being. 



330 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

little is known ; but he was a member of the conserva- 
tive or aristocratic party at Athens, directing his attacks 
chiefly against the democratic or popular party of Peri- 
cles, and continuing to write comedies until about 392 
b.c. While his comedies are replete with coarse wit, 
they are wonderfully brilliant, and contain much, also, 
that is pure and beautiful. As a late writer has well 
said, " Beauty and deformity came to him with equal 
abundance, and his wonderful pieces are made up of all 
that is low and all that is pure and lovely." 

The Muses, seeking for a shrine 

Whose glories ne'er should cease, 
Found, as they strayed, the soul divine 

Of Aristophanes. Plato, trans, by Merivale. 

Mr. Grote characterizes the comedies of Aristophanes 
as follows: "Never probably will the full and unshac- 
kled force of comedy be so exhibited again. Without 
having Aristophanes' actually before us it would have 
been impossible to imagine the unmeasured and unspar- 
ing license of attack assumed by the old comedy upon 
the gods, the institutions, the politicians, philosophers, 
poets, private citizens, specially named— and even the 
women, whose life was entirely domestic— of Athens. 1 
With this universal liberty in respect of subject there is 
combined a poignancy of derision and satire, a fecundity 
of imagination and variety of turns, and a richness of 
poetical expression such as cannot be surpassed, and such 
as fully explains the admiration expressed for him by 
the philosopher Plato, who in other respects must have 
regarded him with unquestionable disapprobation. His 
comedies are popular in the largest sense of the word, 
addressed to the entire body of male citizens on a day 



Sec page 288. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 331 

consecrated to festivity, and providing for their amuse- 
ment or derision, with a sort of drunken abundance, out 
of all persons or things standing in any way prominent 
before the public eye." ' 

In his introduction to the Dialogues of Plato, Eev. 
William Sewell, an English clergyman and author, 
observes that " Men smile when they hear the anecdote 
of Chrys'ostom, one of the most venerable fathers of 
the Church, who never went to bed without something 
from Aristophanes under his pillow." He adds: "But 
the noble tone of morals, the elevated taste, the sound 
political wisdom, the boldness and acuteness of the sat- 
ire, the grand object, which is seen throughout, of cor- 
recting the follies of the day, and improving the con- 
dition of his country — all these are features in Aristoph- 
anes which, however disguised, as they intentionally 
are, by coarseness and buffoonery, entitle him to the 
highest respect from every reader of antiquity." Yet, 
while the purposes of Aristophanes were in the main 
praiseworthy, and the persons and things he attacked 
generally deserving of censure, he spared the vices of 
his own party and associates ; and, like all satirists, for 
effect he often traduced character, as in the case of the 
virtuous Socrates. In an attack on the Sophists, in his 
play of the Clouds, he gives to Socrates the character 
of a vulgar Sophist, and holds him up to the derision of 
the Athenian people. But, as another has said, " Time 
has set all even ; and < poor Socrates,' as Aristophanes 
called him — as a far loftier bard has sung — 

1 Poor Socrates, 
By what he taught, and suffered for so doing, 
For truth's sake suffering death unjust, lives now, 
Equal in fame to proudest conquerors.' " Milton. 



1 "History of Greece," Chap, lxvii. 



332 MOSAICS OF GKECIAN HISTORY. 

The Comedy of the " Clouds? 

It is curious to observe in the Clouds of Aristophanes 
that while the main object of the poet is to ridicule 
Socrates, and through him to expose what he considers 
the corrupt state of education in Athens, he does not 
disdain to mingle with his low buffoonery the loftiest 
flights of the imagination— reminding us of the not un- 
like anomaly of Shakspeare's sublime simile of the 
" cloud-capp'd towers," in the Tempest. In one part 
of the play, Strepsi'ades, who has been nearly ruined in 
fortune by his spendthrift son, goes to Socrates to learn 
from him the logic that will enable him " to talk unjust- 
ly and— prevail," so that he may shirk his debts ! He 
finds the master teacher suspended in air, in a basket, 
that he may be above earthly influences, and there " con- 
templating the sun," and endeavoring to search out 
« celestial matters." To the appeal of Strepsiades, Soc- 
rates, interrupted in his reveries, thus answers : 

Socrates. Old man, sit you still, and attend to my will, and 
hearken in peace to my prayer. (He then addresses the 

Air.) 
O master and king, holding earth in your swing, O measureless 

infinite Air ; 
And thou, glowing Ether, and Clouds who enwreathe her with 

thunder and lightning and storms, 
Arise ye and shine, bright ladies divine, to your student, in 

bodily forms. 

Then we have the farther prayer of Socrates to the 
Clouds, in which is pictured a series of the most sublime 
images, colored with all the rainbow hues of the poet's 
fancy. We are led, in imagination, to behold the dread 
Clouds, at first sitting, in glorious majesty, upon the 
time-honored crest of snowy Olympus— then in the soft 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 333 

dance beguiling the nymphs "'mid the stately advance 
of old Ocean " — then bearing away, in their pitchers of 
sunlight and gold, " the mystical waves of the Nile," to 
refresh and fertilize other lands; at one time sporting on 
the foam of Lake Mseo'tis, and at another playing around 
the wintry summits of Mi'mas, a mountain range of Ionia. 
The farther invocation of the Clouds is thus continued : 

Socrates. Come forth, come forth, ye dread Clouds, and to 

earth your glorious majesty show ; 
Whether lightly ye rest on the time-honored crest of Olympus, 

environed in snow, 
Or tread the soft dance 'mid the stately advance of old Ocean, 

the nymphs to beguile, 
Or stoop to enfold, with your pitchers of gold, the mystical 

waves of the Nile, 
Or around the white foam of Maeotis ye roam, or Mimas all 

wintry and bare, 
O hear while we pray, and turn not away from the rites which 

your servants prepare. 

Then the chorus comes forward and answers, as if the 
Clouds were speaking : 

Chorus. Clouds of all hue, 

Now rise we aloft with our garments of dew. 
We come from old Ocean's unchangeable bed, 
We come till the mountains' green summits we tread, 
We come to the peaks with their landscapes untold, 
We gaze on the earth with her harvests of gold, 
We gaze on the rivers in majesty streaming, 

We gaze on the lordly, invisible sea ; 
We come, for the eye of the Ether is beaming, 
We come, for all Nature is flashing and free. 
Let us shake off this close-clino-ino- dew 
From our members eternally new, 
And sail upward the wide world to view. 
Come away ! Come away ! 



334 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Socr. O goddesses mine, great Clouds and divine, ye have 
heeded and answered my prayer. 
Heard ye their sound, and the thunder around, as it thrilled 
through the petrified air ? 
Streps. Yes, by Zeus ! and I shake, and I'm all of a quake, 
and I fear I must sound a reply, 
Their thunders have made my soul so afraid, and those terrible 
voices so nigh — 
Socr. Don't act in our schools like those comedy-fools, with 
their scurrilous, scandalous ways. 
Deep silence be thine, while these Clusters divine their soul- 
stirring melody raise. 

To which the chorus again responds. But we have not 
room for farther extracts. The description of the float- 
ing-cloud character of the scene is acknowledged by 
critics to be inimitable. There is one passage, in par- 
ticular, in which Socrates, pointing to the clouds that 
have taken a sudden slanting downward motion, says: 

" They are drifting, an infinite throng, 
And their long shadows quake over valley and brake"— 

which, Mr. Kuskin declares, "could have been written 
by none but an ardent lover of the hill scenery— one 
who had watched hour after hour the peculiar, oblique, 
sidelono- action of descending clouds, as they form along 
the hollows and ravines of the hills. 1 There are no 
lumpish solidities, no billowy protuberances here. Ail 
is melting, drifting, evanescent, full of air, and light as 
dew." ■ 

. The line in Greek, whloh is so vividly descriptive of this peculiar ap- 
pearance and motion of the clouds— 

dta -rail/ KolXoov KaJ twv daaeav, avrai ir\afim,— 

loses so much in the rendering, that the heauty of the passage can be fully 
appreciated only by the Greek scholar. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 335 

Choral Song from "The Birds?' 

In the following extract from the comedy of The 
Birds, Aristophanes ridicules the popular belief of the 
Greeks in signs and omens drawn from the birds of the 
air. Though undoubtedly an exaggeration, it may nev- 
ertheless be taken as a fair exposition of the supersti- 
tious notions of an age that had its world-renowned 
" oracles," and as a good example of the poet's comic 
style. The extract is from the Choral Song in the 
comedy, and is a true poetic gem. 

Ye children of man ! whose life is a span, 
Protracted with sorrow from day to day ; 
Naked and featherless, feeble and querulous, 
Sickly, calamitous creatures of clay ! 
Attend to the words of the sovereign birds. 
Immortal, illustrious lords of the air, 
"Who survey from on high, with a merciful eye, 
Your struggles of misery, labor, and care. 
Whence you may learn and clearly discern 
Such truths as attract your inquisitive turn — 
Which is busied of late with a mighty debate, 
A profound speculation about the creation, 
And organical life and chaotical strife — 
With various notions of heavenly motions, 
And rivers and oceans, and valleys and mountains, 
And sources of fountains, and meteors on high. 
And stars in the sky. . . .We propose by-and-by 
(If you'll listen and hear) to make it all clear. 

All lessons of primary daily concern 

You have learned from the birds (and continue to learn), 

Your best benefactors and early instructors. 

We give you the warnings of seasons returning : 

When the cranes are arranged, and muster afloat 

In the middle air, with a creaking note, 



336 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Steering away to the Libyan sands, 

Then careful farmers sow their lands ; 

The craggy vessel is hauled ashore ; 

The sail, the ropes, the rudder, and oar 

Are all unshipped and housed in store. 

The shepherd is warned, by the kite re-appearing, 

To muster his flock and be ready for shearing. 

You quit your old cloak at the swallow's behest, 

In assurance of summer, and purchase a vest. 

For Delphi, for Ammon, Dodo'na— in fine, 

For every oracular temple and shrine — 

The birds are a substitute, equal and fair ; 

For on us you depend, and to us you repair 

For counsel and aid when a marriage is made — 

A purchase, a bargain, or venture in trade : 

Unlucky or lucky, whatever has struck ye — 

A voice in the street, or a slave that you meet, 

A name or a word by chance overheard — 

If you deem it an omen you call it a bird ; 

And if birds are your omens, it clearly will follow 

That birds are a proper prophetic Apollo. 

Trans, by Frere. 

III. HISTORY. 

As we have stated in a former chapter, literary com- 
positions in prose first appeared among the Greeks in 
the sixth century B.C., and were either mythological, or 
collections of local legends, whether sacred or profane, 
of particular districts. It was not until a still later pe- 
riod that the Grecian prose writers, becoming more posi- 
tive in their habits of thought, broke away from specu- 
lative and mystical tendencies, and began to record their 
observations of the events daily occurring about them. 
In the writings of Hecatse'us of Mile'tus, who flourished 
about 500 b.c, we find the first elements of history ; and 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 337 

yet some modern writers think he can lay no claim what- 
ever to the title of historian, while others regard him as 
the first historical writer of any importance. He visited 
Greece proper and many of the surrounding countries, 
and recorded his observations and experiences in a work 
of a geographical character, entitled Periodus. He also 
wrote another work relating to the mythical history of 
Greece, and died about 467 b.c. 

HEROD'OTUS. 

Mahaffy considers Hecatse'us " the forerunner of He- 
rodotus in his mode of life and his conception of setting 
down his experiences ;" while Nie'buhr, the great Ger- 
man historian, absolutely denies the existence of any 
Grecian histories before Herodotus gave to the world 
the first of those illustrious productions that form an- 
other bright link in the literary chain of Grecian glory. 
Born in Halicarnas'sus about the year 484, of an illus- 
trious family, Herodotus was driven from his native land 
at an early age by a revolution, after which he travelled 
extensively over the then known world, collecting much 
of the material that he subsequently used in his writings^ 
After a short residence at Samos he removed to Athens, 
leaving there, however, about the year 440 to take up 
his abode at Thu'rii, a new Athenian colony near the 
site of the former Syb'aris. Here he lived the rest of 
his life, dying about the year 420. Lucian relates that, 
on completing his work, Herodotus went to Olympia 
during the celebration of the Olympic games, and there 
recited to his countrymen the nine books of which his 
history was composed. His hearers were delighted, and 
immediately honored the books with the title of the 
Nine Muses. A later account of this scene savs that 
Thucydides, then a young man, stood at the side of He- 
rodotus, and was affected to tears by his recitations. 

15 



338 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Herodotus modestly states the object of his history in 
the following paragraph, which is all the introduction 
that he makes to his great work : « These are the re- 
searches of Herodotus of Halicarnassus, which he pub- 
lishes in the hope of thereby preserving from decay the 
remembrance of what men have done, and of prevent- 
ing the great and wonderful actions of the Greeks and 
the barbarians from losing their due meed of glory ; 
and, withal, to put on record what were their grounds 
of feud." 1 But while he portrays the military ambi- 
tion of the Persian rulers, the struggles of the Greeks 
for liberty, and their final triumph over the Persian 
power, he also gives us a history of almost all the then 
known world. " His work begins," says Mr. Lawrence, 
« with the causes of the hostility between Persia and 
Greece, describes the power of Crce'sus,.the wonders of 
Eoypt, the expedition of Darius into Scythia, and closes 
with the immortal war between the allied Greeks and the 
Persian hosts. To his countrymen the story must have 
had the intense interest of a national ode or epic. 
Athens, particularly, must have read with touching ar- 
dor the graceful narrative of its early glory ; for when 
Herodotus finished his work the brief period had al- 
ready passed away. What ^Eschylus and the other 
dramatists painted in brief and striking pictures on the 
stao-e Herodotus described with laborious but never 
tedious minuteness. His pure Ionic diction never 
wearies, his easy and simple narrative has never lost its 
interest, and all succeeding ages have united in calling 
him < the Father of History.' His fame has advanced 
with the progress of letters, and has spread over man- 
kind." 

The following admirable description of Herodotus 



Rawlinson's translation. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 339 

and of his writings is from an essay on " History," by 
Lord Macaulay : 

Herodotus and his Writings. 

" Of the romantic historians, Herodotus is the earliest 
and the best. His animation, his simple-hearted tender- 
ness, his wonderful talent for description and dialogue, 
and the pure, sweet flow of his language, place him at 
the head of narrators. He reminds us of a delightful 
child. There is a grace beyond the reach of affectation 
in his awkwardness, a malice in his innocence, an intelli- 
gence in his nonsense, and an insinuating eloquence in 
his lisp. We know of no other writer who makes such 
interest for himself and his book in the heart of the 
reader. He has written an incomparable book. He has 
written something better, perhaps, than the best history ; 
but he has not written a really good history ; for he is, 
from the first to the last chapter, an inventor. We do 
not here refer merely to those gross fictions with which 
he has been reproached by the critics of later times, but 
we speak of that coloring which is equally diffused over 
his whole narrative, and which perpetually leaves the 
most sagacious reader in doubt what to reject and what 
to receive. The great events are, no doubt, faithfully 
related ; so, probably, are many of the slighter circum- 
stances, but which of them it is impossible to ascertain. 
We know there is truth, but we cannot exactly decide 
where it lies. 

"If we may trust to a report not sanctioned, indeed, 
by writers of high authority, but in itself not improba- 
ble, the work of Herodotus was composed not to be 
read, but to be heard. It was not to the slow circula- 
tion of a few copies, which the rich only could possess, 
that the aspiring author looked for his reward. The 
great Olympian festival was to witness his triumph. 



340 MOSAICS OF GEECIAN HISTORY. 

The interest of the narrative and the beauty of the style 
were aided by the imposing effect of recitation — by the 
splendor of the spectacle, by the powerful influence of 
sympathy. A critic who could have asked for authori- 
ties in the midst of such a scene must have been of a 
cold and sceptical nature, and few such critics were 
there. As was the historian, such were the auditors — 
inquisitive, credulous, easily moved by the religious awe 
of patriotic enthusiasm. They were the very men to 
hear with delight of strange beasts, and birds, and trees ; 
of dwarfs, and giants, and cannibals; of gods whose 
very names it was impiety to utter ; of ancient dynas- 
ties which had left behind them monuments surpassing 
all the works of later times ; of towns like provinces ; 
of rivers like seas; of stupendous walls, and temples, 
and pyramids ; of the rites which the Magi performed 
at daybreak on the tops of the mountains ; of the secrets 
inscribed on the eternal obelisks of Memphis. With 
equal delight they would have listened to the graceful 
romances of their own country. They now heard of the 
exact accomplishment of obscure predictions; of the 
punishment of crimes over which the justice of Heaven 
had seemed to slumber; of dreams, omens, warnings 
from the dead; of princesses for Whom noble suitors 
contended in every generous exercise of strength and 
skill ; and of infants strangely preserved from the dag- 
ger of the assassin to fulfil high destinies. 

"As the narrative approached their own times the 
interest became still, more absorbing. The chronicler 
had now to tell the story of that great conflict from 
which Europe dates its intellectual and political su- 
premacy — a story which, even at this distance of time, 
is the most marvellous and the most touching in the 
annals of the human race— a story abounding with all 
that is wild and wonderful ; with all that is pathetic and 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 341 

animating ; with the gigantic caprices of infinite wealth 
and despotic power; with the mightier miracles of wis- 
dom, of virtue, and of courage.* He told them of riv- 
ers dried up in a day, of provinces famished for a meal ; 
of a passage for ships hewn through the mountains ; of 
a road for armies spread upon the waves ; of monarchies 
and commonwealths swept away ; of anxiety, of terror, 
of confusion, of despair ! ' and then of proud and stub- 
born hearts tried in that extremity of evil and not found 
wanting; of resistance long maintained against desper- 
ate odds ; of lives dearly sold when resistance could be 
maintained no more ; of signal deliverance, and of un- 
sparing revenge. Whatever gave a stronger air of real- 
ity to a narrative so well calculated to inflame the pas- 
sions and to flatter national pride, was certain to be 
favorably received." 

THUCYDIDES. 

Greater even than Herodotus, in some respects, but 
entirely different in his style of composition, was the 
historian Thucydides, who was born in Athens about 
471 b.c. In early life he studied in the rhetorical and 
sophistical schools of his native city ; and he seems to 
have taken some part in the political agitations of the 
period. In his forty -seventh year he commanded an 
Athenian fleet that was sent to the relief of Amphip'olis, 
then besieged by Bras'idas the Spartan. But Thucydi- 
des was too late ; on his arrival the city had surrendered. 
His failure to reach there sooner appears to have been 
caused by circumstances entirely beyond his control, al- 
though some English scholars, including Gkote, declare 
that he was remiss and dilatory, and therefore deserving 
of the punishment he received— banishment from Ath- 



1 See page 235. 



342 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ens. He retired to Scaptes'y-le, a small town in Thrace ; 
and in this secluded spot, removed from the shifting 
scenes of Grecian life, he devoted himself to the compo- 
sition of his great work. Tradition asserts that he was 
assassinated when about eighty years of age, either at 
Athens or in Thrace. 

The history of Thucydides, unfinished at his death, 
gives an account of nearly twenty-one years of the Pelo- 
ponnesian war. The author's style is polished, vigorous, 
philosophical, and sometimes so concise as to be obscure. 
We are told that even Cicero found some of his sen- 
tences almost unintelligible. But, as Mahaffy says: 
" Whatever faults of style, whatever transient fashion of 
involving his thoughts, may be due to a Sophistic educa- 
tion and to the desire of exhibiting depth and acuteness, 
there cannot be the smallest doubt that in the hands of 
Thucydides the art of writing history made an extraor- 
dinary stride, and attained a degree of perfection which 
no subsequent Hellenic (and few modern) writers have 
equalled. If the subject which he selected was really a 
narrow one, and many of the details trivial, it was never- 
theless compassed with extreme difficulty, for it is at all 
times a hard task to write contemporary history, and 
more especially so in an age when published documents 
were scarce, and the art of printing unknown. More- 
over, however trivial may be the details of petty military 
raids, of which an account was yet necessary to the com- 
pleteness of his record, we cannot but wonder at the 
lo'fty dignity with which he has handled every part of 
the subject. There is not a touch of comedy, not a point 
of satire, not a word of familiarity throughout the whole 
book, and we stand face to face with a man who strikes us 
as strangely un- Attic in his solemn and severe temper." 



i "History of Greek Literature," vol. ii., p. 117. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 343 

The following comparison, evidently a just one, has 
been made between Thucydides and Herodotus : 

Thucydides and Herodotus. 

"In comparing the two great historians, it is plain 
that the mind and talents of each were admirably suited 
to the work which he took in hand. The extensive field 
in which Herodotus labored afforded an opportunity for 
embellishing and illustrating his history with the mar- 
vels of foreign lands ; while the glorious exploits of a 
great and free people stemming a tide of barbarian in- 
vaders and finally triumphing over them, and the cus- 
toms and histories of the barbarians with whom they 
had been at war, and of all other nations whose names 
were connected with Persia, either by lineage or con- 
quest, were subjects which required the talents of a sim- 
ple narrator who had such love of truth as not wilfully 
to exaggerate, and such judgment as to select what was 
best worthy of attention. But Thucydides had a nar- 
rower field. The mind of Greece was the subject of his 
study, as displayed in a single w T ar which was, in its rise, 
progress, and consequences, the most important which 
Greece had ever seen. It did not in itself possess that 
heart-stirring interest which characterizes the Persian 
war. In it united Greece was not struggling for her 
liberties against a foreign foe, animated by one common 
patriotism, inspired by an enthusiastic love of liberty ; 
but it presented the sad spectacle of Greece divided 
against herself, torn by the jealousies of race, and dis- 
tracted by the animosities of faction. 

" The task of Thucydides, therefore, was that of study- 
ing the warring passions and antagonistic workings of 
one mind ; and it was one which, in order to become in- 
teresting and profitable, demanded that there should be 
brought to bear upon it the powers of a keen, analytical 



344 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

intellect. To separate history from the traditions and 
falsehoods with which it had been overlaid, and to give 
the early history of Greece in its most truthful form ; to 
trace Athenian supremacy from its rise to its ruin, and 
the growing jealousy of other states, whether inferiors 
or rivals, to which that supremacy gave rise ; to show its 
connection with the enmities of race and the opposition 
of politics ; to point out what causes led to such wide 
results ; how the insatiable ambition of Athens, gratify- 
ing itself in direct disobedience to the advice of her w T ise 
statesman, Pericles, led step by step to her ultimate ruin, 
— required not a mere narrator of events, however brill- 
iant, but a moral philosopher and a statesman. Such 
was Thucydides. Although his work shows an advance, 
in the science of historical composition, over that of He- 
rodotus, and his mind is of a higher, because of a more 
thoughtful order, yet his fame by no means obscures the 
glory which belongs to the Father of History. Their 
walks are different ; they can never be considered as ri- 
vals, and therefore neither can claim superiority." 1 



IV. PHILOSOPHY. 
ANAXAG'ORAS. 

The most illustrious of the Ionic philosophers, and the 
first distinguished philosopher of this period of Grecian 
history, was Anaxagoras, who was born at Clazom'ense 
in the year 499 u.c. At the age of twenty he went to 
Athens, where he remained thirty years, teaching phi- 
losophy, and having for his hearers Pericles, Socrates, 
Euripides, and other celebrated characters. While the 
pantheistic systems of Tha'les, Heraeli'tus, and other 
early philosophers admitted, in accordance with the fic- 

1 " Greek and Roman Classical Literature," by Professor R. W. Browne, 
King's College, London. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 845 

tions of the received mythology, that the universe is full 
of gods, the doctrine of Anaxagoras led to the belief 
of but one supreme mind or intelligence, distinct from 
the chaos to which it imparts motion, form, and order. 
Hence he also taught that the sun is an inanimate, fiery 
mass, and therefore not a proper object of worship. He 
asserted that the moon shines by reflected light, and he 
rightly explained solar and lunar eclipses. He gave 
allegorical explanations of the names of the Grecian 
gods, and struck a blow at the popular religion by at- 
tributing the miraculous appearances at sacrifices to nat- 
ural causes. For these innovations he was stoned by 
the populace, and, as a penalty for what was considered 
his impiety, he was condemned to death ; but through 
the influence of Pericles his sentence waft commuted to 
banishment. He retired to Lamp'sacus, on the Helles- 
pont, where he died at the age of seventy-two. 

A short time before his death the senate of Lampsa- 
cus sent to Anaxagoras to ask what commemoration of 
his life and character would be most acceptable to him. 
He answered, " Let all the boys and girls have a play- 
day on the anniversary of my death." The suggestion 
was observed, and his memory was honored by the peo- 
ple of Lampsacus for many centuries with a yearly fes- 
tival. The amiable disposition of Anaxagoras, and the 
general character of his teachings, are pleasantly and 
very correctly set forth in the following poem, which is 
a supposed letter from the poet Cleon, of Lampsacus, to 
Pericles, giving an account of the philosopher's death : 

The Death of Anaxagoras. 
Cleon of Lampsacus, to Pericles : 
Of him she banished now let Athens boast ; 
Let now th' Athenian raise to him they stoned 
A statue. Anaxagoras is dead ! 

15* 



346 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

To you who mourn the master, called him friend, 
Beat back th' Athenian wolves who fanged his throat, 
And risked your own to save him — Pericles — 
I now unfold the manner of his end : 

The aged man, who found in sixty years 
Scant cause for laughter, laughed before he died, 
And died still smiling : Athens vexed him not ! 
Not he, but your Athenians, he would say, 
Were banished in his exile ! 

When the dawn 
First glimmers white o'er Lesser Asia, 
And little birds are twittering in the grass, 
And all the sea lies hollow and gray with mist, 
And in the streets the ancient watchmen doze, 
The master woke with cold. His feet were chill, 
And reft of sense ; and we who watched him knew 
The fever had not wholly left his brain % 
For he was wandering, seeking nests of birds, 
An urchin from the green Ionian town 
Where he was born. We chafed his clay-cold limbs ; 
And so he dozed, nor dreamed, until the sun 
Laughed out — broad day — and flushed the garden gods 
Who bless our fruits and vines in Lampsacus. 

Feeble, but sane and cheerful, he awoke, 

And took our hands and asked to feel the sun ; 

And where the ilex spreads a gracious shade 

We placed him, wrapped and pillowed ; and he heard 

The charm of birds, the whisper of the vines, 

The ripple of the blue Propontic sea. 

Placid and pleased he lay ; but we were sad 

To see the snowy hair and silver beard 

Like withering mosses on a fallen oak, 

And feel that he, whose vast philosophy 

Had cast such sacred branches o'er the fields 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 347 

Where Athens pastures her dull sheep, Jay fallen, 
And never more should know the spring ! Confess 
You too had grieved to see it, Pericles ! 

But Anaxagoras owned no sense of wrono-; 

And when we called the plagues of all your gods 

On your ungrateful city, he but smiled : 

"Be patient, children ! Where would be the gain 

Of wisdom and divine astronomy, 

Could we not school our fretful minds to bear 

The ills all life inherits ? / can smile 

To think of Athens ! Were they much to blame ? 

Had I not slain Apollo ? plucked the beard 

Of Jove himself ? Poor rabble, who have yet 

Outgrown so little the green grasshoppers 

From whom they boast descent, 1 are they to blame ? 

" How could they dream — or how believe when taught — 

The sun a red-hot iron ball, in bulk 

Not less than Peloponnesus ? How believe 

The moon no silver goddess girt for chase, 

But earth and stones, with caverns, hills, and vales ? 

Poor grasshoppers ! who deem the gods absorbed 

In all their babble, shrilling in the grass ! 

What wonder if they rage, should one but hint 

That thunder and lightning, born of clashing clouds, 

Might happen even with Jove in pleasant mood, 

Not thinking of Athenians at all !" 

He paused ; and, blowing softly from the sea, 
The fresh wind stirred the ilex, shaking down 



1 The Athenians claimed to be of indigenous origin— Autoc7i'lho-nes, that 
is, Aborigines, sprung from the earth itself. As emblematic of this ori- 
gin they wore in their hair the golden forms of the cicada, or locust often 
improperly called grasshopper, which was believed to spring from the 
earth. So it was said that the Athenians boasted descent from erass- 
hoppers. & 



348 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Through chinks of sunny leaves blue gems of sky ; 
And lying in the shadow, all his mind 
O'ershadowed by our grief, once more he spoke : 
" Let not your hearts be troubled ! All my days 
Hath all my care been fixed on this vast blue, 
So still above us ; now my days are done, 
Let it have care of me ! Be patient, meek, 
Not puffed with doctrine ! Nothing can be known ; 
Naught grasped for certain : sense is circumscribed ; 
The intellect is weak, and life is short !" 

He ceased, and mused a little while we wept 
" And yet be nowise downcast ; seek, pursue ! 
The lover's rapture and the sage's gain 
Less in attainment lie than in approach.. 
Look forward to the time which is to come ! 
All things are mutable, and change alone 
Unchangeable. But knowledge grows ! The gods 
Are drifting from the earth like morning mist ; 
The days are surely at the doors when men 
Shall see but human actions in the world ! 
Yea, even these hills of Lampsacus shall be 
The isles of some new sea, if time fail not !" 

And now the reverend fathers of our town 
Had heard the master's end was very near, 
And come to do him homage at the close, 
And ask what wish of his they might fulfil. 
But he, divining that they thought his heart 
Might yearn to Athens for a resting-place, 
Said gently, " Nay ; from everywhere the way 
To that dark land you wot of is the same. 
I feel no care ; I have no wish. The Greeks 
Will never quite forget my Pericles, 
And when they think of him, will say of me, 
J Twas Anaxagoras taught him/" 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 349 

Loath to go, 
No kindly office done, yet once again 
The reverend fathers pressed him for a wish. 
Then laughed the master : " Nay, if still you urge, 
And since 'twere churlish to reject good-will, 
I pray you, every year, when time brings back 
The day on which I left yon, let the boys — 
All boys and girls in this your happy town — 
Be free of task and school for that one day." 

He lay back smiling, and the reverend men 
Departed, heavy at heart. He spoke no more, 
But, haply musing on his truant days, 
Passed from us, and was smiling when he died. 

William Canton, in The Contemporary Review. 

The teachings of Anaxagoras were destined to attain 
to wide-spread power over the Grecian mind. As augu- 
ries, omens, and prodigies exercised a great influence on 
the public affairs of Greece, a philosophical explanation 
of natural phenomena had a tendency to diminish re- 
spect for the popular religion in the eyes of the multi- 
tude, and to leave the minds of rulers and statesmen 
open to the influences of reason, and to the rejection of 
the follies of superstition. The doctrines taught by 
Anaxagoras were the commencement of the contest be- 
tween the old philosophy and the new ; and the varying 
phases of the struggle appear throughout all subsequent 
Grecian history. 

THE SOPHISTS. 

In the fifth century there sprang up in Greece a set 
of teachers who travelled about from city to city, giving 
instruction (for money) in philosophy and rhetoric ; un- 
der which heads were included political and moral edu- 
cation. These men were called " Sophists " (a term early 
applied to wise men, such as the seven sages), and though 



850 MOSAICS OF GKECTAN HISTORY. 

they did not form a sect or school, they resembled one 
another in many respects, exerting an important, and, 
barring their sceptical tendencies, a healthful influence 
in the formation of character. Among the most emi- 
nent of these teachers were Protag'oras of Abde'ra, 
Gor'gias of Leontini, and Prod'icus of Ce'os. That great 
philosopher of a later age, Plato, while condemning the 
superficiality of their philosophy, characterized these men 
as important and respectable thinkers ; but their succes- 
sors, by their ignorance, brought reproach upon their 
calling, and, in the time of Socrates, the Sophists— so- 
called— had lost their influence and had fallen into con- 
tempt. " Before Plato had composed his later^ Dia- 
logues," says Mahaffy, " they had become too insignifi- 
cant to merit refutation ; and in the following genera- 
tion they completely disappear as a class." This author 
thus proceeds to give the causes of their fall : 

" It is, of course, to be attributed not only to the op- 
position of Socrates at Athens, but to the subdivision of 
the profession of education. Its most popular and prom- 
inent branch— that of PJietoric— was taken up by special 
men, like the orator An'tiphon, and developed into a 
strictly defined science. The Philosophy which they 
had touched without sounding its depths was taken up 
by the Socratic schools, and made the rule and practice 
of a life. The Politics which they had taught were 
found too general ; nor were these wandering men, with- 
out fixed home, or familiarity with the intricacies of 
special constitutions, likely to give practical lessons to 
Greek citizens in the art of state-craft. Thus they dis- 
appear almost as rapidly as they rose— a sudden phase 
of spiritual awakening in Greece, like the Encyclopae- 
dists of the French." 1 



i " History of Classical Greek Literature," vol. ii., p. 63. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 351 



SOCRATES. 

The greatest teacher of this age was Socrates, who was 
born near Athens in 469 e.g. His father was a sculptor, 
and the son for some time practised the same profession 
at Athens, meanwhile aspiring toward higher things, 
and pursuing the study of philosophy under Anaxagoras 
and others. He served his country in the Held in the 
severe struggle between Sparta and Athens, where he was 
distinguished for his bravery and endurance ; and when 
upward of sixty years of age he was chosen to represent 
his district in the Senate of Five Hundred. Here, and 
under the subsequent tyranny, his integrity remained 
unshaken ; and his boldness in denouncing the cruelties 
of the Thirty Tyrants nearly cost him his life. As a 
teacher, Socrates assumed the character of a moral phi- 
losopher, and he seized every occasion to communicate 
moral wisdom to his fellow-citizens. Although often 
classed with the Sophists, and unjustly selected by Aris- 
tophanes as their representative, the whole spirit of his 
teachings was directly opposed to that class. Says Ma- 
haffy, " The Sophists were brilliant and superficial, he 
was homely and thorough ; they rested in scepticism, he 
advanced through it to deeper and sounder faith ; they 
were wandering and irresponsible, he was fixed at 
Athens, and showed forth by his life the doctrines he 
preached." Geote, however, while denying that the 
Sophists were intellectual and moral corrupters, as gen- 
erally charged, also denies that the reputation of Socra- 
tes properly rests upon his having rescued the Athenian 
mind from their influences. He admires Socrates for 
" combining with the qualities of a good man a force of 
character and an originality of speculation as well as of 
method, and a power of intellectually working on oth- 
ers, generically different from that of any professional 



852 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

teacher, without parallel either among contemporaries 

or successors." 1 

Socrates taught without fee or reward, and communi- 
cated his instructions freely to high and low, rich and 
poor. His chief method of instruction was derived from 
the style of Zeno, of the Eleatic school, and consisted of 
attacking the opinions of his opponents and pulling 
them to pieces by a series of questions and answers. 2 He 
made this system "the most powerful instrument of 
philosophic teaching ever known in the history of the 
human intellect." The philosopher was an enthusiastic 
lover of Athens, and he looked upon the whole city as 
his school. There alone he found instruction and occupa- 
tion, and through its streets he would wander, standing 
motionless for hours in deep meditation, or charming all 
classes and ages by his conversation. Alcibiades de- 
clared of him that, " as he talks, the hearts of all who 
hear leap up, and their tears are poured out." The poet 
Thomson, musing over the sages of ancient time, thus 
describes him : 

O'er all shone out the great Athenian sage, 

And father of Philosophy ! 

Tutor of Athens ! he, in every street, 

Dealt priceless treasure ; goodness his delight, 

Wisdom his wealth, and glory his reward. 

Deep through the human heart, with playful art, 

His simple question stole, as into truth 

And serious deeds he led the laughing race ; 

Taught moral life; and what he taught he was. 



i " History of Greece," Chap, lxviii. 

» A fine example of the Socratic mode of disputation may be seen in 
"Alciphron: or, the Minute Philosopher," by George Berkeley, D.D., 
Bishop of Cloyne, Ireland. It is a defence of the Christian religion and 
an expose of the weakness of infidelity and scepticism, and is considered 
one of the most ingenious and excellent performances of the kind in the 
English tongue. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 353 

Of the unjust attack made upon Socrates by the poet 
Aristophanes we have already spoken. 1 That occurred 
in 423 b.c, and, as a writer has well said, " evaporated 
with the laugh "—having nothing to do with the sad 
fate of the guiltless philosopher twenty-four years after. 
Soon after the restoration of the democracy in Athens 
(403 e.c.) Socrates was tried for his life on the absurd 
charges of impiety and of corrupting the morals of the 
young. His accusers appear to have been instigated by 
personal resentment, which he had innocently provoked, 
and by envy of his many virtues ; and the result shows 
not only the instability but the moral obliquity of the 
Athenian character. He approached his trial with no 
special preparation for defence, as he liad no expectation 
of an acquittal ; but he maintained a calm, brave, and 
haughty bearing, and addressed the court in a bold and 
uncompromising tone, demanding rewards instead of 
punishment. It was the strong religious persuasion (or 
belief) of Socrates that he was acting under a divine 
mission. This consciousness had been the controlling 
principle of his life ; and in the following extracts which 
we have taken from his Apology, or Defence, in which 
he explains his conduct, we see plain evidences of this 
striking characteristic of the great philosopher : 

The Defence of Socrates? 
" Strange, indeed, would be my conduct, O men of 
Athens, if now, when, as I conceive and imagine, God 
orders me to fulfil the philosopher's mission of searching 
into myself and other men, I were to desert my post 
through fear of death, or any other fear : that would 
indeed be strange, and I might justly be arraigned in 
court for denying the existence of the gods, if I dis- 

1 Pp. 331, 332. " " 

2 From the translation by Professor Jowctt, of Oxford University. 



£54 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

obeyed the oracle because I was afraid of death: then 
I should be fancying I was wise when I was not wise. 
For this fear of death is indeed the pretence of wisdom, 
and not real wisdom, being the appearance of knowing 
the unknown; since no one knows whether death, 
which he in his fear apprehends to be the greatest evil, 
may not be the greatest good. Is there not here con- 
ceit of knowledge which is a disgraceful sort of igno- 
rance? And this is the point. in which, as I think, I 
am superior to men in general, and in which I might, 
perhaps, fancy myself wiser than other men— that where- 
as I know but little of the world below, I do not sup- 
pose that I know ; but I do know that injustice and dis- 
obedience to a better, whether God or man, is evil and 
dishonorable, and I will never fear or avoid a possible 
cood rather than a certain evil. And therefore should 
you say to me, < Socrates, this time we will not mmd 
An'ytus, and will let you off, but upon one condition, 
that you are not to inquire and speculate in this way 
any more, and that if you are caught doing this again 
you shall die'— if this were the condition on which you 
let me go, I should reply, < Men of Athens, I honor and 
love you ; but I shall obey God rather than you, and 
while I have life and strength I shall never cease from 
the practice and teaching of philosophy, and exhorting, 
after my manner, any one whom I meet, 5 * * * I do 
nothing but go about persuading you all, old and young 
alike not to take thought for your persons or your 
properties, but first and chiefly to care about the great- 
est improvement of the soul. I tell you that virtue is 
not given by money, but that from virtue come money 
and every other good of man, public as well as private. 
This is my teaching ; and if this is the doctrine which 
corrupts the youth, my influence is ruinous indeed. 
But if any one says that this is not my teaching, he is 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 355 

speaking an untruth. Wherefore, O men of Athens, 
I say to yon, do as Anytus bids or not as Anytus bids, 
and either acquit me or not ; but whatever you do, know 
that I shall never alter my ways, not even if I have to 
die many times." 

Socrates next refers to the indignation that he may 
have occasioned because he has not wept, begged, and 
entreated for his life, and has not brought forward his 
children and relatives to plead for him, as others would 
have done on so serious an occasion. He says that he 
has relatives, and three children ; but he declares that 
not one of them shall appear in court for any such pur- 
pose—not from any insolent disposition on his part, but 
because he believes that such a course would be degrad- 
ing to the reputation which he enjoys, as well as a dis- 
grace to the state. He then closes his defence as fol- 
lows : 

"But, setting aside the question of dishonor, there 
seems to be something wrong in petitioning a judge, 
and thus procuring an acquittal, instead of informing 
and convincing him. For his duty is not to make a 
present of justice, but to give judgment; and he has 
sworn that he will adjudge according to the law, and not 
according to his own good pleasure; and neither he nor 
we should get into the habit of perjuring ourselves— 
there can be no piety in that. Do not, then, require me 
to do what I consider dishonorable, and impious, and 
wrong, especially now, when I am being tried for im- 
piety. For if, O men of Athens, by force of persuasion 
and entreaty, I could overpower your oaths, then I 
should be teaching you to believe that there are no gods, 
and convict myself, in my own defence, of not believing 
in them. But that is not the case ; for I do believe that 
there are gods, and in a far higher sense than that in 
which any of my accusers believe in them. And to you 



356 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

and to God I commit my cause, to be determined by 
you as is best for you and me." 

As he had expected, and as the tenor of his speech 
had assured his friends would be the case, Socrates was 
found guilty— but by a majority of only five or six in 
a body of over five hundred. He would make no prop- 
osition, as was his right, for a mitigation of punishment ; 
and after sentence of death had been passed upon him 
he spent the remaining thirty days of his life in impres- 
sing on the minds of his friends the most sublime les- 
sons in philosophy and virtue. Many of these lessons 
have been preserved to us in the works of Plato, in 
whose Phce'do, which pictures the last hours of the pris- 
on, life of Socrates, we find a sublime conversation on 
the immortality of the soul. The following is an ex- 
tract from this work : 

Socrates' s Views of a Future State. 
« When the dead arrive at the place to which their 
demon leads them severally, first of all they are judged, 
as well those who have lived well and piously as those 
who have not. And those who appear to have passed 
a middle kind of life, proceeding to Ach'eron, and em- 
barking in the vessels they have, on these arrive at the 
lake, and there dwell; and when they are purified, and 
have suffered punishment for the iniquities they may 
have committed, they are set free, and each receives the 
reward of his good deeds according to his deserts ; but 
those who appear to be incurable, through the magni- 
tude of their offences, either from having committed 
many and great sacrileges, or many unjust and lawless 
murders, or other similar crimes, these a suitable desti- 
ny hurls into Tartarus, whence they never come forth. 
But those who appear to have been guilty of curable 
yet great offences, such as those who through anger 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 357 

have committed any violence against father or mother, 
and have lived the remainder of their life in a state of 
penitence, or they who have become homicides in a sim- 
ilar manner— these must, of necessity, fall into Tartarus ; 
but after they have fallen, and have been there a year' 
the wave casts them forth, the homicide into Coey'tus,' 
but the parricides and matricides into Pyriphleg'ethon ; a 
but when, being borne along, they arrive at the Ache- 
ru'sian 3 lake, there they cry out to and invoke, some, 
those whom they slew, others, those whom they injured ; 
and, invoking them, they entreat and implore them to 
suffer them to go out into the lake and to receive them ; 
and if they persuade them, they go out, and are freed 
from their sufferings ; but if not, they are borne back 
to Tartarus, and thence again to the rivers, and they do 
not cease from suffering this until they have persuaded 
those whom they have injured— for this sentence was 
imposed on them by the judges. But those who are 
found to have lived an eminently holy life— these are 
they who, being freed and set at large from these re- 
gions in the earth as from a prison— arrive at the pure 
abode above, and dwell on the upper parts of the earth. 
And among these, those who have sufficiently purified 
themselves by philosophy shall live without bodies 
throughout all future time, and shall arrive at habita- 
tions yet more beautiful than these, which it is neither 

1 Co-cy'tus, see p. 3. 

a Pyr-i-phlaj'e-thon, "fire-blazing;" one of the rivers of hell. 
3 AcJi'e-roti, see p. 3. 

Cocytus signifies the river of wailing; Pyriphlegcthon, the river that 
burns with fire; Acheron, the river of woe; and the Styx, another river 
of the lower world, the river of hatred. Thus Homer, in describing 

Pluto's murky abode,' ' says : 

There, into Acheron runs not alone 
Dread Pyriphlegethon, but Cocytus loud, 
From Styx derived ; there also stands a rock, 
At whose broad base the roaring rivers meet. 

Odyssey. B. X. 



358 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

easy to describe, nor at present is there sufficient time 

for the purpose. 

"For the sake of these things which we have de- 
scribed we should use every endeavor to acquire virtue 
and wisdom in this life, for the reward is noble and the 
hope great. To affirm positively, however, that these 
things are exactly as I have described them, does not 
become a man of sense ; but that either this, or some- 
thing of the kind, takes place with respect to our souls 
and "their habitations— since our soul is certainly im- 
mortal— appears to me most fitting to be believed, and 
worthy the hazard for one who trusts in its reality ; for 
the hazard is noble, and it is right to allure ourselves 
with such things, as with enchantments ; for which rea- 
son I have prolonged my story to such length. On ac- 
count of these things, then, a man ought to be confident 
about his soul, who during this life has disregarded all 
the pleasures and ornaments of the body as foreign from 
his nature, and who, having thought that they do more 
harm than good, has zealously applied himself to the 
acquirement of knowledge, and who, having adorned 
his soul not with a foreign but with its own proper or- 
naments-temperance, justice, fortitude, freedom, and 
truth— thus waits for his passage to Hades as one who 
is ready to depart whenever destiny shall summon 

him." 

After some farther conversation with his friends re- 
specting: the disposition to be made of his body, and 
having said farewell to his family, Socrates drank the 
fatal hemlock with as much composure as if it had been 
the last draught at a cheerful banquet, and quietly lud 
himself down and died. ."Thus perished," says Db. 
Smith, " the greatest and most original of Grecian phi- 
losophers, whose uninspired wisdom made the nearest ap- 
proach to the divine morality of the Gospel." As ob- 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 359 

served by Professor Tyler of Amherst College, " The 
consciousness of a divine mission was the leading trait 
in his character and the main secret of his power. This 
directed his conversations, shaped his philosophy, imbued 
his very person, and controlled his life. This was the 
power that sustained him in view of approaching death, 
inspired him with more than human fortitude in his 
last days, and invested his dying words with a moral 
grandeur that 'has less of earth in it than heaven.'" 1 
There was a more special and personal influence, how- 
ever, to which Socrates deemed himself subject through 
life, and which probably moved him to view death with 
such calmness. 

With all his practical wisdom, the great philosopher 
was not free from the control of superstitious fancies. 
He not only always gave careful heed to divinations, 
dreams, and oracular intimations, but he believed that 
he was warned and restrained, from childhood, by a 
familiar spirit, or demon, which he was accustomed to 
speak of familiarly and to obey implicitly. A writer, 
in alluding to this subject, says : " There is no more 
curious chapter in Grecian biography than the story of 
Socrates and his familiar demon, which, sometimes un- 
seen, and at other times, as he asserted, assuming hu- 
man shape, acted as his mentor; which preserved his 
life after the disastrous battle of De'lium, by pointing 
out to him the only secure line of retreat, while the 
lives of his friends, who disregarded his entreaties to 
accompany him, were sacrificed ; and which, again, when 
the crisis of his fate approached, twice dissuaded him 
from defending himself before his accusers, and in the 
end encouraged him to quaff the poisoned cup presented 
to his lips by an ungrateful people." 



1 Preface to "Plato's Apology and Crito." 



360 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ART. 

Having briefly traced the history of Grecian litera- 
ture in its best period, it remains to notice some of the 
monuments of art, " with which," as Alison says, " the 
Athenians have overspread the world, and which still 
form the standard of taste in every civilized nation on 
earth." ; 

I. SCULPTURE AND PAINTING. 

Grecian sculpture, as we have seen, had attained 
nearly the summit of its perfection at the commence- 
ment of the Persian wars. Among those who now gave 
to it a wider range may be mentioned Pythagoras, of 
Ehegium, and Myron, a native of Eleu'therse. The 
former executed works in bronze representing contests 
of heroes and athletes; but he was excelled in this 
field by Myron, who was also distinguished for his rep- 
resentations of animals. The energies of sculpture, 
however, were to be still more directly concentrated 
and perfected in a new school. That school was at 
Athens, and its master was Phid'ias, an Athenian paint- 
er, sculptor, and architect, who flourished about 460 b.c. 
" At this point," observes Lubke, 1 " begins the period 
of that wonderful elevation of Hellenic life which was 
ushered in by the glorious victory over the Persians. 
ISTow, for the first time, the national Hellenic mind rose 
to the highest consciousness of noble independence and 
dignity. Athens concentrated within herself, as in a 
focus, the whole exuberance and many-sidedness of 
Greek life, and glorified it into beautiful unity. Now, 
for the first time, the deepest thoughts of the Hellenic 
mind were embodied in sculpture, and the figures of 

i « Outlines of the History of Art," by Wilhelm Liibkc; Clarence 
Cook's edition. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 361 

the gods rose to that solemn sublimity in which art 
embodied the idea of divinity in purely human form. 
This victory of the new time over the old was effected 
by the power of Phidias, one of the most wonderful 
artist-minds of all time." 

Phidias was intrusted by Pericles with the superin- 
tendence of the public works erected or adorned by 
that lavish ruler, and his own hands added to them 
their most valuable ornaments. But before he was 
called to this employment his statues had adorned the 
most celebrated temples of Greece. " These inimitable 
works," says Gillies, 1 " silenced the voice of envy; and 
the most distinguished artists of Greece— sculptors, paint- 
ers, and architects— were ambitious to receive the direc- 
tions, and to second the labors of Phidias, which were 
uninterruptedly employed, during fifteen years, in the 
embellishment of his native city." The chief character- 
istic of Phidias was ideal beauty of the snblimest order 
in the representation of divinities and their worship; and 
he substituted ivory for marble in those parts of statues 
that were uncovered, such as the face, hands, and feet, 
while for the covered portion he substituted solid gold 
in place of wood concealed with real drapery. The 
style and character of his work are well described by 
Lubke, as follows : 

"That Phidias especially excelled in creating images 
of the gods, and that he preferred, as subjects for his 
art, those among the divinities the essence of whose 
nature was spiritual majesty, marks the fundamental 
characteristic of his art, and explains its superiority, not 
only to all that had been produced before his time, but 
to all that was contemporary with him, and to all that 
came after him. Possessed of that unsurpassable mas- 



1 Gillies's " History of Ancient Greece," p. 178. 

16 



362 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

terly power in the representation of the physical form 
to which Greek art, shortly before his time, had at- 
tained by unceasing endeavor, his lofty genius was called 
upon to apply these results to the embodiment of the 
highest ideas, and thus to invest art with the character 
of°sublimity, as well as with the attributes of perfect 
beauty. Hence it is said of him, that he alone had seen 
images of the gods, and he alone had made them visible 
to others. Even in the story that, in emulation with 
other masters, he made an Amazon, and was defeated 
• in the contest by his great contemporary Polycle'tus, we 
see a confirmation of the ideal tendency of his art. But 
that his works realized the highest conceptions of the 
people, and embodied the ideal of the Hellenic concep- 
tion of the divinity, is proved by the universal admira- 
tion of the ancient world. This sublimity of concep- 
tion was combined in him with an inexhaustible exu- 
berance of creative fancy, an incomparable care in the 
completion of his work, and a masterly power in over- 
coming every difficulty, both in the technical execution 
and in the material." 

Probably the first important work executed by Phid- 
ias at Athens was the colossal bronze image of Minerva, 
which stood on the Acropolis. It was nearly seventy 
feet in height, and was visible twenty miles out at sea. 
It was erected by the Athenians, in memory of their 
victory over the Persians, with the spoils of Marathon. 
A smaller bronze statue, on the same model, was also 
erected on the Acropolis. But the greatest of the works 
of Phidias at Athens was the ivory and gold statue of 
Minerva in the Parthenon, erected with the booty taken 
at Salamis. It was forty feet high, representing the 
goddess, "not with her shield raised as the vigorous 
champion of her people, but as a peaceful, protecting, 
and victory-giving divinity." Phidias was now called 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 363 

to Elis, and there he executed his crowning work, the 
gold and ivory statue of Jupiter at Olympia. "The 
father of the gods and of men was seated on a splendid 
throne in the cella of his Olympic temple, his head en- 
circled witli a golden olive- wreath ; in his right hand 
he held Nike, who bore a fillet of victory in her hands 
and a golden wreath on her head ; in his left hand rested 
the richly-decorated sceptre." The throne was adorned 
with gold and precious stones, and on it were represented 
many celebrated scenes. "From this immeasurable ex- 
uberance of figures," says Lubke, " rose the form of the 
highest Hellenic divinity, grand' and solemn and won- 
derful in majesty. Phidias had represented him as the 
kindly father of gods and men, and also as the mighty 
ruler in Olympus. As he conceived his subject he must 
have had in his mind those lines of Homer, in which 
Jupiter graciously grants the request of Thetis: 

1 As thus he spake, the son of Saturn gave 
The nod with his dark brows. The ambrosial curls 
Upon the sovereign one's immortal head 
Were shaken, and with them the mighty Mount 
Olympus trembled.' " l 

While the art of painting was early developed in 
Greece, certainly as far back as 718 b.c., the first painter 
of renown was Polygno'tus, of Tha'sos, who went to 
Athens about 463 b.c, and established there what was 
called "the Athenian school" of painting. Aristotle 
called him " the painter of character," as he was the first 
to give variety to the expression of the countenance, 
and ease and grace to the outlines of figures or the flow 
of drapery. He painted many battle scenes, and with 
his contemporaries, Diony'sius of Colophon, Mi'con, 



1 Iliad,!., 528-530. Bryant's translation. 



364 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

and others, he embellished many of the public buildings 
in Athens, and notably the Temple of Theseus, with 
representations of figures similar to those of the sculp- 
tor. About 404 b.c. painting reached a farther degree 
of excellence in the hands of Apollodo'rus, a native of 
Athens, who developed the principles of light and shade 
and gave to the art a more dramatic range. Of this 
school Zeux'is, Parrha'sius, and Timan'thes became the 
chief masters. 

parrhasius. 

Of the artists of this period it has been asserted by 
some authorities that Parrhasius was the most cele- 
brated, as he is said to have " raised the art of painting 
to perfection in all that is exalted and essential ;" unit- 
ing in his works "the classic invention of Polygnotus, 
the magic tone of Apollodorus, and the exquisite design 
of Zeuxis." He was a native of Ephesus, but became a 
citizen of Athens, where he won many victories over his 
contemporaries. One of these is recorded by Pliny as 
having been achieved in a public contest with Zeuxis. 
The latter displayed a painting of some grapes, which 
were so natural as to deceive the birds, that came and 
pecked at them. Zeuxis then requested that the curtain 
which was supposed to screen the picture of Parrhasius 
be withdrawn, when it was found that the painting of 
Parrhasius was merely the representation of a curtain 
thrown over a picture-frame. The award of merit was 
therefore given to Parrhasius, on the ground that while 
Zeuxis had deceived the birds, Parrhasius had deceived 
Zeuxis himself. 

The Koman philosopher Seneca also tells a story of 
Parrhasius as follows : While engaged in making a paint- 
ing of "Prometheus Bound," betook an old Olynthian 
captive and put him to the torture, that he might catch, 



GKECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 365 

and transfer to canvas, the natural expression of the 
most terrible of mortal sufferings. This story, we may 
hope, is a fiction ; but the incident is often alluded to by 
the poets, and the American poet Willis has painted 
the alleged scene in lines scarcely less terrible in their 
coloring than those pallid hues of death-like agony which 
we may suppose the painter-artist to have employed. 

Parrhasius and his Captive. 

Parrhasius stood gazing forgetfully 

Upon his canvas. There Prometheus lay, 

Chained to the cold rocks of Mount Cau'casus — 

The vulture at his vitals, and the links 

Of the lame Lemnian 1 festering in his flesh ; 

And, as the paiuter's mind felt throuoh the dim. 

Rapt mystery, and plucked the shadows forth 

With its far-reaching fancy, and with form 

And color clad them, his fine, earnest eye 

Flashed with a passionate fire ; and the quick curl 

Of his thin nostril, and his quivering lip, 

Were like the wing'd god's, 2 breathing from his flight. 

" Bring me the captive now ! 
My hands feel skilful, and the shadows lift 
From my waked spirit airily and swift, 

And I could paint the bow 
Upon the bended heavens, around me play 
Colors of such divinity to-day. 

" Ha ! bind him on his back ! 
Look ! as Prometheus in my picture here ! 
Quick, or he faints ! stand with the cordial near ! 

Now — bend him to the rack ! 



» Vulcan, the Olympian artist, who, when hurled from heaven, fell upon 
the Island of Lemnos, in the ^Egean. He forged the chain with which 
Prometheus was bound. See page 45. * The winged god Mercury 



366 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Press down the poisoned links into his flesh, 
And tear agape that healing wound afresh ! 

" So, let him writhe ! How long 
Will he live thus? Quick, my good pencil, now ! 
What a fine agony works upon his brow ! 

Ha! gray-haired, and so strong! 
How fearfully he stifles that short moan ! 
Gods ! if I could but paint a dying groan ! 

" ' Pity ' thee ! So I do. 
I pity the dumb victim at the altar; 
But does the robed priest for his pity falter? 

I'd rack thee though I knew 
A thousand lives were perishing in thine ! 
What were ten thousand to a fame like mine ? 

" Yet there's a deathless name ! 
A spirit that the smothering vault shall spurn, 
And like a steadfast planet mount and burn ; 

And, though its crown of flame 
Consumed my brain to ashes as it shone, 
By all the fiery stars I'd bind it on ! 

" Av, though it bid me rifle 
My heart's last fount for its insatiate thirst ; 
Though every life-strung nerve be maddened first ; 

Though it should bid me stifle 
The yearning in my throat for my sweet child, 
And taunt its mother till my brain went wild — 

" All— I would do it all 
Sooner than die, like a dull worm, to rot — 
Thrust foully into earth to be forgot ! 

O heavens ! but I appall 
Your heart, old man ! Forgive— ha ! on your lives 
Let him not faint !— rack him till he revives ! 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 367 

" Vain — vain — give o'er. His eye 
Glazes apace. He does not feel you now ; 
Stand back ! I'll paint the death-dew on his brow. 

Gods ! if he do not die 
But for one moment — one — till I eclipse 
Conception with the scorn of those calm lips ! 

" Shivering ! Hark ! he mutters 
Brokenly now : that was a difficult breath — 
Another ? Wilt thou never come, O Death ? 

Look how his temple flutters ! 
Is his heart still ? Aha ! lift up his head ! 
He shudders — gasps — Jove help him ! so — he's dead !" 
* * * • * * * 

How like a mounting devil in the heart 
Rules the unreined ambition ! Let it once 
But play the monarch, and its haughty brow 
Glows with a beauty that bewilders thought, 
And unthrones peace forever. Putting on 
The very pomp of Lucifer, it turns 
The heart to ashes, and with not a spring 
Left in the bosom for the spirit's lip, 
We look upon our splendor and forget 
The thirst of which we perish ! 



II. ARCHITECTURE. 

In Architecture, too, thy rank supreme! 
That art where most magnificent appears 
The little builder, man ; by thee refined, 
And smiling high, to full perfection brought. 

Thomson. 

We have already referred, in general terms, to the 
monuments of art for which the era of Athenian great- 
ness was distinguished, and have stated that it was more 
particularly in the "Age of Pericles" that Athenian 
genius and enthusiasm found their full development, in 



368 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the erection or adornment of those miracles of architect- 
ure that crowned the Athenian Acropolis or surrounded 
its base. The following eloquent description, from the 
pen of Bulwer, will convey a vivid idea of the magni- 
tude and the brilliancy of the labors performed for 

The Adornment of Athens. 

" Then rapidly progressed those glorious fabrics which 
seemed, as Plutarch gracefully expresses it, endowed 
with the bloom of a perennial youth. Still the houses 
of private citizens remained simple and unadorned ; still 
were the streets narrow and irregular ; and, even centu- 
ries afterward, a stranger entering Athens would not at 
first have recognized the claims of the mistress of Gre- 
cian art. But to the homeliness of her common thor- 
oughfares and private mansions the magnificence of 
her public edifices now made a dazzling contrast. The 
Acropolis, that towered above the homes and thorough- 
fares of men — a spot too sacred for human habitation — 
became, to use a proverbial phrase, ' a city of the gods.' 
The citizen was everywhere to be reminded of the maj- 
esty of the state — his patriotism was to be increased by 
the pride in her beauty — his taste to be elevated by the 
spectacle of her splendor. 

" Thus flocked to Athens all who throughout Greece 
were eminent in art. Sculptors and architects vied with 
one another in adorning the young empress of the seas : 
then rose the masterpieces of Phidias, of Callic'rates, of 
Mnesicles, which, either in their broken remains, or in 
the feeble copies of imitators less inspired, still com- 
mand so intense a wonder, and furnish models so immor- 
tal. And if, so to speak, their bones and relics excite 
our awe and envy, as testifying of a lovelier and grander 
race, which the deluge of time has swept away, what, in 
that day, must have been their brilliant effect, unmuti- 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 369 

lated in their fair proportions— fresh in all their linea- 
ments and hues? For their beauty was not limited to 
the symmetry of arch and column, nor their materials 
confined to the marbles of Pentel'icus and Pa'ros. Even 
the exterior of the temples glowed with the richest har- 
mony of colors, and was decorated with the purest gold : 
an atmosphere peculiarly favorable to the display and 
the preservation of art, permitted to external pediments 
and friezes all the minuteness of ornament — all the 
brilliancy of colors, such as in the interior of Italian 
churches may yet be seen— vitiated, in the last, by a 
gaudy and barbarous taste. Nor did the Athenians spare 
any cost upon the works that were, like the tombs and 
tripods of their heroes, to be the monuments of a nation 
to distant ages, and to transmit the most irrefragable 
proof 'that the power of ancient Greece was not an idle 
legend.' " ' 



1. THE ACROPOLIS AND ITS SPLENDORS. 

The Acropolis, the fortress of Athens, was the centre 
of its architectural splendor. It is a rocky height rising 
abruptly out of the Attic plain, and was accessible onl^ 
on the western side, where stood the Propylee'a, a mag- 
nificent structure of the Doric order, constructed under 
the direction of Pericles by the architect Mnesicles, and 
which served as the gate as well as the defence of the 
Acropolis. But the latter's chief glory was the Parthe- 
non, or Temple of Minerva, built in the time of Pericles 
by Icti'nus and Calibrates, and which stood on the 
highest point, near the centre. It was constructed en- 
tirely of the most beautiful white marble from Mount 
Pentelicns, and its dimensions were two hundred and 
twenty-eight feet by one hundred and two — bavin* 



1 "Athens : Its Rise and Fall," pp. 256, 257. 

16* 



370 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

eight Doric columns in each of the two fronts, and sev- 
enteen in each of the sides, and also an interior range 
of six columns in each end. The ceiling of the west- 
ern part of the main building was supported by four 
interior columns, and of the eastern end by sixteen. 
The entire height of the building above its platform 
was sixty -five feet. The whole was enriched within 
and without with matchless works of art by various 
artists under the direction of Phidias— its chief won- 
der, however, being the gold and ivory statue of the 
Virgin Goddess, the work of Phidias himself, elsewhere 

described. 

This magnificent structure remained entire until the 
year 1687, when, during a siege of Athens by the Vene- 
tians, a bomb fell on the devoted Parthenon, and, setting 
fire to the powder that the Turks had stored there, en- 
tirely destroyed the roof and reduced the whole building 
almost to ruins. 1 The eight columns of the eastern front, 
however, and several of the lateral colonnades, are still 
standing ; and the whole, dilapidated as it is, retains an 
air of inexpressible grandeur and sublimity. 

The Parthenon. 

Fair Parthenon ! yet still must fancy weep 

For thee, thou work of nobler spirits flown. 
Bright as of old the sunbeams o'er thee sleep 

In all their beauty still— and thine is gone ! 
Empires have sunk since thou wast first revered, 

And varying rites have sanctified thy shrine. 
The dust is round thee of the race that reared 

Thy walls, and thou— their fate must still be thine ! 
But when shall earth again exult to see 
Visions divine like theirs renewed in aught like thee? 



See page 486. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 371 

Lone are thy pillars now — each passing gale 

Sighs o'er them as a spirit's voice, which moaned 
That loneliness, and told the plaintive tale 

Of the bright synod once above them throned* 
Mourn, graceful ruin ! on thy sacred hill 

Thy gods, thy rites, a kindred fate have shared: 
Yet art thou honored in each fragment still 

That wasting years and barbarous hands have spared ; 
Each hallowed stone, from rapine's fury borne, 
Shall wake bright dreams of thee in ages yet unborn. 

Yes ; in those fragments, though by time defaced, 

And rude, insensate conquerors, yet remains 
All that may charm th' enlightened eye of taste, 

On shores where still inspiring freedom reigns. 
As vital fragrance breathes from every part 

Of the crushed myrtle, or the bruised rose, 
E'en thus th' essential energy of art 

There in each wreck imperishably glows ! 
The soul of Athens lives in every line, 
Pervading brightly still the ruins of her shrine. 

Mrs. Hemans. 

North of the Parthenon stood the Erechthe'um, an ir- 
regular but beautiful structure of the Ionic order, dedi- 
cated to the worship of Neptune and Minerva. Consid- 
erable remains of it are still standing. In addition to 
the great edifices of the Acropolis referred to, which 
were adorned with the most finished paintings and 
sculptures, the entire platform of the hill appears to 
have been covered with a vast composition of architect- 
ure and sculpture, consisting of temples, monuments, and 
statues of gods and heroes. The whole Acropolis was at 
once the fortress, the sacred enclosure, and the treasury 
of the Athenian people— forming the noblest museum 
of sculpture, the richest gallery of painting, and the best 
school of architecture in the world. 



372 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

2. OTHER ARCHITECTURAL MONUMENTS OF ATHENS. 

Beneath the southern wall of the Acropolis was the 
Theatre of Bacchus, capable of seating thirty thousand 
persons, and the seats of which, rising one above another, 
were cut out of the sloping rock. Adjoining this on the 
east was the Ode'um, a smaller covered theatre, built by 
Pericles, and so constructed as to imitate the form of 
Xerxes's tent. On the north-east side was the Prytane'- 
um, where were many statues, and where citizens who 
had rendered service to the state were maintained at the 
public expense. A short distance to the north-west of 
the Acropolis, and separated from it only by some hollow 
ground, was the small eminence called Areop'agus, or 
Hill of Mars, at the eastern extremity of which was situ- 
ated the celebrated court of Areopagus. About a quar- 
ter of a mile south-west stood the Pnyx, the place where 
the public assemblies of Athens were held in its palmy 
days, and a spot that will ever be associated with the re- 
nown of Demosthenes and other famed orators. The 
steps by which the speaker mounted the rostrum, and a 
tier of three seats for the audience, hewn in the solid 
rock, are still visible. 

The only other monument of art to which we shall 
refer in this connection is the celebrated Temple of The- 
seus, built of marble by Cimon as a resting-place for the 
bones of the distinguished hero. 1 It is of the Doric 
order, one hundred and four feet by forty-five, and sur- 
rounded by columns, of which there are six at each front 
and thirteen at the sides. The roof, friezes, and cor- 
nices of this temple have been but little impaired by 
time, and the whole is one of the most noble remains of 
the ancient magnificence of Athens, and the most nearly 

i Cimon conquered the island of Scy'ros, the haunt of pirates, and 
brought thence to Athens what were supposed to be the bones of Theseus. 



GRECIAN LITERATURE AND ART. 373 

perfect, if not the most beautiful, existing specimen of 
Grecian architecture. 

The Temple of Theseus. 

Here let us pause, e'en at the vestibule 

Of Theseus' fame. With what stern majesty 

It rears its ponderous and eternal strength, 

Still perfect, still unchanged, as on the day 

When the assembled throng of multitudes 

With shouts proclaimed the accomplished work, and fell 

Prostrate upon their faces to adore 

Its marble splendor ! 

How the golden gleam 
Of noonday floats upon its graceful form. 
Tinging each grooved shaft, and storied frieze, 
And Doric triglyph ! How the rays amid 
The opening columns, glanced from point to point, 
Stream down the gloom of the long portico ! 
* * * * * 

How the long pediment, 
Embrowned with shadows, frowns above, and spreads 
Solemnity and reverential awe! 

Proud monument of old magnificence ! 
Still thou survivest ; nor has envious Time 
Impaired thy beauty, save that it has spread 
A deeper tint, and dimmed the polished glare 
Of thy refulgent whiteness. Haygarth. 

So much for some of the architectural wonders of 
Athens. As Bulwer says, "It was the great charac- 
teristic of these works that they were entirely the crea- 
tion of the people. Without the people Pericles could 
not have built a temple nor engaged a sculptor. The 
miracles of that day resulted from the enthusiasm of a 
population yet young — full of the first ardor for the 



374 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

beautiful— dedicating to the state, as to a mistress, the 
trophies honorably won, or the treasures injuriously ex- 
torted, and uniting the resources of a nation with the 
energy of an individual, because the toil, the cost, were 
borne by those who succeeded to the enjoyment and ar- 
rogated the glory." Talfourd, in his Athenian Cap- 
tive, calls all that went to make up Athens in the days 

of her glory 

An opening world, 

Diviner than the soul of man hath yet 

Been gifted to imagine — truths serene 

Made visible in beauty, that shall glow 

In everlasting freshness, unapproached 

By mortal passion, pure amid the blood 

And dust of conquests, never waxing old, 

But on the stream of time, from age to age, 

Casting bright images of heavenly youth 

To make the world less mournful. 



THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES. 375 



CHAPTER XIII. 

THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES. 

I. THE EXPEDITION OF CYRUS, AND THE RETREAT OF THE 

TEN THOUSAND. 

The aid given by Cyrus the Persian to Sparta in her 
contest with Athens, as related in a preceding chapter 
was bestowed with the understanding that Sparta should 
give him her assistance against his elder brother, Arta- 
xerxes Mne'mon, should he ever require it. According- 
ly, when the latter succeeded to the Persian throne on 
the death of his father, Cyrus, still governor of 'the 
maritime region of Asia Minor, prepared to usurp his 
brother's regal power. For this purpose he raised an 
army of one hundred thousand Persians, which he 
strengthened with an auxiliary force of thirteen thou- 
sand Greeks, drawn principally from the cities of Asia 
under the dominion of Sparta. On the Grecian force 
commanded by Cle-ar'chus, a Spartan, Cyrus placed his 
mam reliance for success. 

With these forces Cyrus marched from Sardis, in the 
spring of 401, to within seventy miles of Babylon with- 
out the least opposition. Here, however, he was met 
by Artaxerxes, at the head of nine hundred thousand 
men. This immense force was at first driven back • 
but in the conflict that ensued Cyrus rashly charged the 
guards that surrounded his brother, and was slain. His 
Persian troops immediately fled, leaving the Greeks al- 
most alone, in the presence of an immense hostile force 
and more than a thousand miles from any friendly terri- 



376 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

tory. The victorious enemy proposed to the Grecians 
terms of accommodation, but, having invited Clearchus 
and other leaders to a conference, they treacherously 
put them to death. No alternative now remained to 
the Greeks but to submit to the Persians or light their 
way back to their own land. They bravely chose 
the latter course — and, selecting Xenophon, a young 
Athenian, for their leader, after a four months' march, 
attended with great suffering and almost constant bat- 
tling with brave and warlike tribes, ten thousand of 
their number succeeded in reaching the Grecian settle- 
ments on the Black Sea. Proclaiming their joy by loud 
shouts of " The sea ! the sea !" the Greek heroes gave 
vent to their exultation in tears and mutual embraces. 

Hence, through the continent, ten thousand Greeks 
Urged a retreat, whose glory not the prime 
Of victories can reach. Deserts in vain 
Opposed their course ; and hostile lands, unknown ; 
And deep, rapacious floods, dire banked with death ; 
And mountains, in whose jaws destruction grinned ; 
Hunger and toil ; Armenian snows and storms ; 
And circling myriads still of barbarous foes. 
Greece in their view, and glory yet untouched, 
Their steady column pierced the scattering herds 
Which a whole empire poured ; and held its way 
Triumphant, by the sage, exalted chief 
Fired and sustained. 

O light, and force of mind, 
Almost mighty in severe extremes! 
The sea at last from Colchian mountains seen, 
Kind-hearted transport round their captains threw 
The soldiers' fond embrace ; o'erflowed their eyes 
With tender floods, and loosed the general voice 

To cries resounding loud— "The sea! the sea!" 

Thomson. 



THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES. 377 

Xenophon, who afterward became an historian of his 
country, has left an admirable narrative of this expedi- 
tion, and " The Eetreat of the Ten Thousand," in his 
Anab'asis, written with great clearness and singular 
modesty. Eeferring to the expedition, and to the his- 
torian's account of it, Dr. Curtius makes the following 
interesting observations : 

: ' Although this military expedition possesses no imme- 
diate significance for political history, yet it is of high 
importance, not only for our knowledge of the East, but 
also for that of the Greek character ; and the accurate 
description which we owe to Xenophon is, therefore, one 
of the most valuable documents of antiquity. We see 
a band of Greeks of the most various origin, torn out 
of all their ordinary spheres of life, in a strange quarter 
of the globe, in a long complication of incessant move- 
ments, and of situations ever-varying and full of peril, 
in which the real nature of these men could not but 
display itself with the most perfect truthfulness. This 
army is a typical chart, in many colors, of the Greek 
population— a picture, on a small scale, of the whole 
people, with all its virtues and faults, its qualities of 
strength and of weakness— a wandering political commu- 
nity, which, according to home usage, holds its assem- 
blies and passes its resolutions, and at the same time a 
wild and not easily manageable band of free-lances. 
They are men in full measure agitated by the unquiet 
spirit of the times, which had destroyed in them their 
affection for their native land ; and yet how closely 
they cling to its most ancient traditions ! Visions in 
dream and omens, sent by the gods, decide the most 
important resolutions, just as in the Homeric camp be- 
fore Troy : most assiduously the sacrifices are lit, the 
paeans sung, altars erected, and games celebrated, in 
honor of the saviour gods, when at last the aspect of 



378 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the longed-for sea animates afresh their vigor and their 

courage. 

"This multitude has been brought together by love 
of lucre and quest of adventure ; and yet in the critical 
moment there manifest themselves a lively sense of 
honor and duty, a lofty heroic spirit, and a sure tact in 
perceiving what counsels are the best. Here, too, is 
visible the mutual jealousy existing among the several 
tribes of the nation ; but the feeling of their belonging 
together, the consciousness of national unity, prevail 
over all ; and the great mass is capable of sufficient good- 
sense and self-denial to subordinate itself to those who, 
by experience, intelligence, and moral courage, attest 
themselves as fitted for command. And how very re- 
markable it is that in this mixed multitude of Greeks 
it is an Athenian who by his qualities towers above all 
the rest, and becomes the real preserver of the entire 
army! Xenophon had only accompanied the army as 
a volunteer; yet it was he who, obeying an inner call, 
re-awakened a higher, a Hellenic consciousness, courage, 
and prudence among his comrades, and who brought 
about the first salutary resolutions. Possessing the 
Athenian superiority of culture which enabled him to 
serve these warriors as spokesman, negotiator, and gen- 
eral, to him it was essentially due that, in spite of un- 
speakable trials, they finally reached the coast." ? 



II. THE SUPREMACY OF SPARTA. 

On the fall of Athens, Sparta became the mistress of 
Greece. Her power and his own wealth induced Ly- 
sander to appear again in public life. He first attempted 
to overthrow the two regal families of Sparta, and, by 

i " History of Greece," vol. iv., pp. 191, 192. 



THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES. 379 

making the crown an elective office, secure his own 
accession to it. But he failed in this, although, on the 
death of A'gis, King of Sparta, he succeeded in setting 
aside Leo-tych'i-des, the son and rightful successor of 
Agis, and giving the office to Agesila'us, the late king's 
brother. The government of Sparta now became far 
more oppressive than that of Athens had been, and it 
was not long before some of the Grecian states under 
her sway united in a league against her. 

The part which the Greek cities of Asia took in the 
expedition of Cyrus involved them in a war with Per- 
sia, in which they were aided by the Spartans. Agesi- 
la'us entered Asia with a considerable force (396 b.c), 
and in the following year he defeated the Persians in a 
great battle on the plains of Sardis, in Lydia. But in 
394 the Spartan king was called home to avert the dan- 
gers which threatened his country in a war that had 
been fomented by the Persian king in order to save his 
dominions from the ravages of the Spartans. The King 
of Persia had supplied Athens with a fleet which de- 
feated the Spartan navy at Cni'dus, and Persian gold 
rebuilt the walls of Athens. A battle soon followed 
between the Spartans on one side and the Thebans and 
Athenians on the other, in which the former were de- 
feated and Lysander was slain. On the other hand, 
Athens and her allies were defeated, in the same year, 
in the vicinity of Corinth, and on the plains of Corone'a. 
Finally, after the war had continued eight years, and 
Sparta had virtually lost her maritime power, the peace 
of Antal'cidas, as it is called, was concluded with Persia, 
at the instance of Sparta, and was ratified by all the 
states engaged in the contest (387 b.c). 

By the treaty with Persia, Athens regained three of 
the islands she had been obliged to relinquish to Sparta 
under Lysander; but the Greek cities in Asia were 



\ 



380 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

given up to Persia, and both Athens and Sparta lost 
their former allies. It was the unworthy jealousy of the 
Grecians, which the Persian king knew how to stimu- 
late, that prompted them to give up to a barbarian the 
free cities of Asia ; and this is the darkest shade in the 
picture. Though Sparta was the most strongly in favor 
of the terms of the treaty, yet Athens was the greatest 
gainer, for she once more became an independent and 

powerful state. 

It was not long before ambition, and the resentment 
of past injuries, involved Sparta in new wars. When 

I her thirty years' truce with Mantine'a had expired, she 
compelled that city, which had formerly been an un- 
willing ally, to throw down her walls, and dismember 
her territory into the four or five villages out of which 
it had been formed. Each of these divisions was now 
left unfortified, and placed under a separate oligarchical 
government. Sparta did this under the pretext that the 
Mantine'ans had supplied one of her enemies with pro- 
visions during the preceding war, and had evaded their 
share of service in the Spartan army. The jealousy of 
Sparta was next aroused against the rising power of 
Olynthus, a powerful confederacy in the south-eastern 
part of Macedonia, which had become engaged in hos- 
tilities with some rival cities ; and the Spartans readily 
accepted an invitation of one of the latter to send an 

army to its aid. 

The expedition against Olynthus led to an affair of 
much importance. As one of the divisions of the Spar- 
tan army was marching through the Theban territories 
it turned aside, and the Spartan general treacherously 
seized upon the Cadme'a, or Theban citadel, although a 
state of peace existed between Thebes and Sparta (3S2 
b.c). The political morality of Sparta is clearly exhib- 
ited in the arguments by which the Spartan king justi- 



THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES. 381 

fled this palpable and treacherous breach of the treaty 
of Antal'cidas. He declared that the only question for 
the Spartan people to consider was, whether they were 
gainers or losers by the transaction. The assertion made 

by the Athenians on a prior occasion was confirmed 

that, " of all states, Sparta had most glaringly shown 
by her conduct that in her political transactions she 
measured honor by inclination, and justice by expe- 
diency." 

On the seizure of the Theban citadel the most pa- 
triotic of the citizens fled to Athens, while a faction up- 
held by a Spartan garrison ruled the place. Thebes 
now became a member of the Spartan alliance, and fur- 
nished a force for the war against Olynthus. After a 
struggle of four years Olynthus capitulated, the Olyn- 
thian Confederacy was thereby dissolved, and the cities 
belonging to it were compelled to join the Spartan alli- 
ance. As a modern historian observes, "Sparta thus in- 
flicted a great blow upon Hellas; for the Olynthian 
Confederacy might have served as a counterpoise to the 
growing power of Macedon, destined soon to overwhelm 
the rest of Greece." The power of Sparta had now at- 
tained its greatest height, but, as she was leagued on all 
sides with the enemies of Grecian freedom, her unpopu- 
larity was great, and her supremacy was doomed to a 
rapid decline. 



III. THE RISE AND FALL OF THEBES. 

Thebes had been nearly four years in the hands of 
the Spartans when a few determined residents of the 
city rose against their tyrants, and, aided by the exiles 
who had taken refuge at Athens, and by some Athenian 
volunteers, they compelled the Spartan garrison to capit- 
ulate (379 b.c). At the head of the revolution were 



382 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

twoTheban citizens, Pelop'idas and Epaminon'das, young 
men of noble birth and fortune, already distinguished for 
their patriotism and private virtues. They are charac- 
terized by the poet Thomson, as 

Equal to the best ; the Theban Pair 
Whose virtues, in heroic concord joined, 
Their country raised to freedom, empire, fame. 

By their abilities they raised Thebes, hitherto of but lit- 
tle political importance, to the first rank in power among 
the Grecian states. They have been thus described 
by the historian Curtius: "Pelopidas was the heroic 
champion and pioneer who, like Miltiades and Cimon, 
with full energy accomplished the tasks immediately at 
hand ; while Epaminondas was a statesman whose glance 
took a wider range, who organized the state at home, 
and established its foreign relations upon a thoroughly 
thought-out plan. He created the bases of the power of 
Thebes, as Themistocles and Aristides had those of the 
power of Athens; and he maintained them, so long as 
he lived, by the vigor of his mind, like another Pericles. 
And, indeed, it would be difficult to find in the entire 
course of Greek history any other two great statesmen 
who, in spite of differences of character and of outward 
conditions of life, resembled each other so greatly, and 
were, as men, so truly the peers of each other, as Peri- 
cles and Epaminondas." 

The successes of Thebes revived the jealousy and dis- 
trust of Athens, which concluded a peace with Sparta, 
and subsequently formed an alliance with her. But 
the Thebans continued to be successful, and at Teg'yra 
Pelbpidas defeated a greatly superior force and killed 
the two Spartan generals ; while at Leuc'tra Epaminon- 
das, with a force of six thousand Thebans, defeated the 
Lacedaemonian army of more than double that number 



THE SPARTAN AND THEBAN SUPREMACIES. 383 

(371 B.C.). Leuctra lias been called " the Marathon of 
the Thebans," as their defensive war was turned by it 
into a war of conquest. Aided now by the Arca'dians, 
Ar'gives, and E'leans, Epaminondas invaded Laconia, 
appearing before the gates of Sparta, where a hostile 
force had not been seen in five hundred years ; but he 
made no attempt upon the city, and, after laying waste 
with fire and sword the valley of the Euro'tas, he re- 
traced his steps to the frontiers of Arcadia. Another 
expedition was undertaken against the Peloponnesus in 
367 b.c, and the cities of Achaia immediately submitted, 
becoming the allies of Thebes. In 362 the Peloponne- 
sus was invaded for the last time, and at Mantinea 
Epaminondas defeated the Spartans in the most sangui- 
nary contest ever fought among Grecians; but he fell 
in the moment of victory, and the glory of Thebes de- 
parted with him. Before his death, having been told 
that those whom he intended to be his successors in com- 
mand had been slain, lie directed the Thebans to make 
peace. His advice was followed, and a general peace 
was soon after established, on the condition that each 
state should retain its respective possessions. 



384 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTEE XIV. 

THE SICILIAN GEEEKS. 

Before proceeding to the history of the downfall of 
Greece, and her subjugation by a foreign power— a re- 
sult that soon followed the events just narrated— we 
turn aside to notice the affairs of the Sicilian Greeks, 
as more especially presented in the history of Syracuse, 
in all respects the strongest and most prominent of the 
Sicilian cities. 

niERO. 

On the death of Ge'lon, despot of Syracuse, a year 
after the battle of Him'era, 1 the government fell into 
the hands of his brother Hi'ero, a man of great energy 
and determination. He founded the city of JStna, of 
which Pindar says : 

That city, founded strong 

In liberty divine, 

Measured by the Spartan line, 

Has Hiero 'stablish'd for his heritage ; 

To whose firm-planted colony belong 

Their mother-country's laws, 

From nlany a distant age. 

He also added many cities to hisgovernment, and his 
power was not inferior to that of Gelon. The city of 
Cn'mse, on the Italian coast, being harassed by the Car- 
thaginians, the aid of Hiero was solicited by its citizens, 



See page 186. 



THE SICILIAN GREEKS. 385 

and he sent a fleet which severely defeated and almost 
destroyed the squadron of their enemies. Says Pindar 
of this event: 

That leader of the Syracusan host, 

With gallies swiftly-rushing, them pursued ; 

And they his onset rued, 

"When on the Cuman coast 

He dashed their youth in gulfy waves below, 

And rescued Greece from heavy servitude. 

Hiero was likewise a liberal patron of literature and 
the arts, inviting to his court many of the eminent poets 
and philosophers of his time, including Pindar, Simon'- 
ides, Epichar'mus, iEs'chylus, and others; but his many 
great and noble qualities were alloyed by insatiable cu- 
pidity and ambition, and he became noted for " his cruel 
and rapacious government, and as the organizer of that 
systematic espionage which broke up all freedom of 
speech among his subjects." Although the eminent 
men who visited his court have much to say in praise 
of Hiero, Pindar, especially, was too honest and inde- 
pendent to ignore his faults. As Grote says, " Pindar's 
indirect admonitions and hints sufficiently attest the 
real character of Hiero." Of these, the following lines 
from the Pythian ode may be taken as a sample : 

The lightest word that falls from thee, O Kino- f 

Becomes a mighty and momentous thing: 

O'er many placed as arbiter on high, 

Many thy goings watchful see. 

Thy ways on every side 

A host of faithful witnesses descry ; 

Then let thy liberal temper be thy guide. 

If ever to thine ear 

Fame's softest whisper yet was dear, 

Stint not thv bountv's flowino- tide : 

17 



386 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY/. 

Stand at the helm of state ; full to the gale 

Spread thy wind-gathering sail. 

Friend ! let not plausive avarice, spread 

Its lures, to tempt thee from the path of fame : 

For know, the glory of a name 

Follows the mighty dead. Trans, by Elton. 

Hiero was succeeded on his death, in 467 b.c, by his 
brother Thrasybu'lus ; but the latter's tyranny caused 
a popular revolt, and after being defeated in a battle 
with his subjects he was expelled from the country. 
His expulsion was followed by the extinction of the 
Gelonian dynasty at Syracuse, and the institution of a 
popular government there and in other Sicilian cities. 
These free governments, however, gave rise to internal 
revolts and wars that continued many months; and 
finally a general congress of the different cities was 
held, which succeeded in adjusting the difficulties that 
had disturbed the peace of all Sicily. The various cities 
now became independent— though it is probable that the 
governments of all of them continued to be more or less 
disturbed— and were soon distinguished for their mate- 
rial and' intellectual prosperity. Syracuse maintained 
herself as the first city in power ; and in this condition 
of prosperity the Sicilian cities were found at the break- 
ing out of the Peloponnesian war. f 3 

DIONYSIUS THE ELDER. 

Of the Athenian league and expedition against Syra- 
cuse we have already given some account. 1 Soon after, , 
the termination of this contest the Constitution of Syra^ 
cuse was rendered still more democratic by the adoption 
of a new code of laws, prepared by Di'ocles, an eminent 

1 See page 291. 



THE SICILIAN GREEKS. 387 

citizen, who became the director of the government. 
But the Carthaginians now again invaded Sicily, and es- 
tablished themselves over its entire western half. Taking 
advantage of the popular alarm at these aggressions, and 
of the ill success of Diodes and the Syracusan generals 
in opposing them, Diony'sius the Elder, then a young 
man, of low birth, but brave, determined, and talented^ 
having been raised by popular favor to the generalship 
of the Syracusan army, subsequently made himself des- 
pot of the city (405 b.c). Dionysius ruled vigorously, % , 
but with extreme tyranny, for thirty-eight years. By 
the year 384 he had extended his power over nearly all 
Sicily and a part of Magna Grecia, and under his sway 
Syracuse became one of the most powerful empires on 
earth. Plutaech relates that Dionysius boasted that he 
bequeathed to his son an empire "fastened by chains of 
adamant," Like. Hiero, Dionysius was a lover of liter- 
ature, and sought to gain distinction by his poetical 
compositions, some of which won prizes at Athens. He 
also invited Plato to his court; but the philosopher's 
moral conversations were distasteful to the tyrant, who 
finally sold him into slavery, from which he was re- 
deemed by a friend. 

It was during the reign of Dionysius the Elder that 
occurred that memorable incident in the lives of Damon 
and Pythias by which Dionysius himself is best remem- 
bered, and which has passed into history as illustrative 
of the truest and noblest friendship. Damon and Pyth- \ 
ias were distinguished Syracusans, and both were Py- 
thagoreans. Pythias, a strong republican, having been 
seized for calling Dionysius a tyrant, and being con- 
demned to death for attempting to stab him, requested 
a brief respite in order to arrange his affairs, promising 
to procure a friend to take his place and suffer death if 
he should not return. Damon gave himself up as surety, 



388 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

and Pythias was allowed to depart. Just as Damon was 
about to be led to execution, Pythias, who had been de- 
tained by unforeseen circumstances, returned to accept 
his fate and save his friend. Dionysius was so struck 
by these proofs of virtue and magnanimity on the part 
of the two friends that he set both of them free, and re- 
quested to be admitted into their friendship. The sub- 
ject has been repeatedly dramatized, and has formed the 
theme of numerous separate poems. Schiller has a bal- 
lad on the subject ; but he amplifies the incidents of the 
original story, and substitutes other names in place of 
Damon and Pythias. The following are the first three 
and the last three verses from Schiller : 

The Hostage. 

The tyrant Di'onys to seek, 

Stern Mce'rus with his poniard crept ; 
The watchful guards upon him swept ; 
The grim King marked his changeless cheek : 
" What wouldst thou with thy poniard ? Speak !" 
"The city from the tyrant free!" 
" The death-cross shall thy guerdon be." 

" I am prepared for death, nor pray," 
Replied that haughty man, " to live ; 
Enough if thou one grace wilt give: 

For three brief suns the death delay, 

To wed my sister — leagues away ; 

I boast one friend whose life for mine, 

If I should fail the cross, is thine." 

The tyrant mused, and smiled, and said, 

With gloomy craft, " So let it be ; 

Three days I will vouchsafe to thee. 
But mark — if, when the time be sped, 
Thou fail'st, thy surety dies instead. 



THE SICILIAN GREEKS. 389 

His life shall buy thine own release ; 
Thy guilt atoned, my wrath shall cease." 
***** 

The sun sinks down — the gate 's in view, 
The cross looms dismal on the ground — 
The eager crowd gape murmuring round. 

His friend is bound the cross unto. 

Crowd — guards— all — bursts he through ; 

" Me ! Doomsman, me," he shouts, " alone ! 

His life is rescued — lo, mine own !" 

Amazement seized the circling ring ! 
Linked in each other's arms the pair — 
Weeping for joy, yet anguish there ! 

Moist every eye that gazed : they bring 

The wondrous tidings to the King — 
, His breast man's heart at last hath known, 

And the Friends stand before his throne. 

Long silent he, and wondering long, 
Gazed on the pair. " In peace depart, 
Victors, ye have subdued my heart ! 

Truth is no dream ! its power is strong. 

Give grace to him who owns his wrong ! 

'Tis mine your suppliant now to be : 

Ah, let the band of Love— be Three !" 

Trans, by Bulwee. 

Dionysins the Younger succeeded to the government 
of Syracuse in 367, but he was incompetent to the task ; 
and his tyranny and debauchery brought about his tem- 
porary overthrow, ten years later, by Dion, his father's 
brother-in-law. Dion had enjoyed unusual favors under 
Dionysius the Elder, and was now a man of wealth and 
high position, as well as of great energy and marked 
mental capacities. For his talents he was largely in- 
debted to Plato, under whose teachings he became imbued 



390 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

"with that sense of regulated polity, and submission of 
individual will to fixed laws, which floated in the atmos- 
phere of Grecian talk and literature, and stood so high 
in Grecian morality." In one of his letters Plato says, 
"When I explained the principles of philosophy and 
humanity to Dion, I little thought that I was insensibly 
opening a way to the subversion of tyranny I" 

Long before the death of Dionysius the Elder, Dion 
had conceived the idea of liberating Syracuse from des- 
potism and establishing an improved constitutional pol- 
icy, originated by himself ; and, on becoming the chief 
adviser" of the young Dionysius, he tried to convince the 
latter of the necessity of reforming himself and his gov- 
ernment. Although at first favorably impressed with 
the plans of Dion, the young monarch subsequently be- 
came jealous of his adviser and expelled him frorn the 
country. Gathering a few troops from various quarters, 
Dion returned to Sicily ten years after, and, aided by a 
revolt in Syracuse, he soon made himself master of the 
city. Dionysius had meanwhile retired to Ortyg'ia, and 
soon left Sicily for Italy. But the success of Dion was 
short-lived. " Too good for a despot, and yet unfit for a 
popular leader, he could not remain long in the preca- 
rious position he occupied." Both his dictatorship and 
his life came to an end in 354. He became the victim 
of a conspiracy originating with his most intimate friend, 
and was assassinated in his own dwelling. 

Dionysius soon after returned to Syracuse, from the 
government of which he was finally expelled by Timo'- 
leon, a Corinthian, who had been sent from Corinth, at 
the request of some exiled Syracusans, to the relief of 
their native city (343 B.C.). Timoleon made himself mas- 
ter of the almost deserted Syracuse, restored it to some 
degree of its former glory, checked the aspiring power 
of & Carthage by defeating one of its largest armies, 



THE SICILIAN GREEKS. 391 

crushed the petty despots of Sicily, and restored nearly 
the whole island to a state of liberty and order. The 
restoration of liberty to Syracuse by Timoleon was fol- 
lowed by many years of unexampled prosperity. Hav- 
ing achieved the purpose with which he left Corinth, 
Timoleon at once resigned his command and became a 
private citizen of Syracuse. But he became the adviser 
of the Syracusans in their government, and the arbitra- 
tor of their differences, enjoying to a good age "what 
Xenophon calls ' that good, not human, but divine com- 
mand over willing men, given manifestly to persons of 
genuine and highly-trained temperance of character.' " 

HIERO II. 

In 317, Agath'ocles, a bold adventurer of Syracuse, 
usurped its authority by the murder of several thousand 
citizens, and for twenty-eight years maintained his power, 
extending his dominion over a large portion of Sicily, 
and even gaining successes in Africa. After his death, in 
289, successive tyrants ruled, until, in 270, Hiero II., a 
descendant of Gelon, and commander of the Syracusan 
army, obtained the supreme power. Meantime the Car- 
thaginians had gained a decided ascendency in Sicily, and 
in 265 the Romans, alarmed by the movements of so 
powerful a neighbor, and being invited to Sicily to assist 
a portion of the people of Messa'na, commenced what is 
known in history as the first Punic war. Hiero allied 
himself with the Carthaginians, and the combined armies 
proceeded to lay siege to Messana; but they were at- 
tacked and defeated by Ap'pius Clau'dius, the Roman 
consul, and Hiero, panic-stricken, fled to Syracuse. See- 
ing his territory laid waste by the Romans, he prudently 
made a treaty with them, in 263. He remained their 
steadfast ally ; and when the Romans became sole mas- 
ters of Sicily they gave him the government of a large 



392 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

part of the island. His administration was mild, yet firm 
and judicious, lasting in all fifty-four years. With him 
ended the prosperity and independence of Syracuse. 

ARCRIME'DES. 

It was during the reign of Hiero II. that Archimedes, 
a native of Syracuse, and a supposed distant relation of 
the king, made the scientific discoveries and inventions 
that have secured for him the honor of being the most 
celebrated mathematician of antiquity. He was equally 
skilled in astronomy, geometry, mechanics, hydrostatics, 
and optics. His discovery of the principle of specific 
gravity is related in the following well-known story : 
Hiero, suspecting that his golden crown had been fraud- 
ulently alloyed with silver, put it into the hands of 
Archimedes for examination. The latter, entering a 
bath-tub one day, and noticing that he displaced a quan- 
tity of water equal in bulk to that of his body, saw that 
this discovery would give him a mode of determining the 
bulk and specific gravity of King Hiero's crown. Leap- 
ing out of the tub in his delight, he ran home, crying, 
"Eure'ka ! eureka /" I have found it ! I have found it ! 

To show Hiero the wonderful effects of mechanical 
power, Archimedes is said to have drawn some distance 
toward him, by the use of ropes and pulleys, a large 
galley that lay on the shore; and during the siege of 
his native city by the Romans, his great mechanical skill 
was displayed in the invention and manufacture of stu- 
pendous engines of defence. Later historians than Po- 
lybius, Livy, and Plutarch say that on this occasion, also, 
he burnt many Poman ships by concentrating upon them 
the sun's rays from numerous mirrors. Schiller gives 
the following poetic account of a visit, to Archimedes, 
by a young scholar who asked to be taught the art that 
had won the great master's fame : 



THE SICILIAN GREEKS. 393 

To Archimedes once a scholar came : 
' Teach me," he said, " the Art that won thy fame ; 
The godlike Art which gives such boons to toil, 
And showers such fruit upon thy native soil ; 
The godlike Art that girt the town when all 
Eome's vengeance burst in thunder on the wall !" 
" Thou call'st Art godlike— it is so, in truth, 
And was," replied the master to the youth, 
" Ere yet its secrets were applied to use — 
Ere yet it served beleaguered Syracuse. 
Ask'st thou from Art but what the Art is worth? 
The fruit ? For fruit go cultivate the Earth. 
He who the goddess would aspire unto 
Must not the goddess as the woman woo !" 

Trans, by Bulwer. 

Among the discoveries of Archimedes was that of 
the ratio between the cylinder and the inscribed sphere, 
and he requested his friends to place the figures of a 
sphere and cylinder on his tomb. This was done, and, 
one hundred and thirty-six years after, it enabled Cicero' 
the Eoman orator, to find the resting-place of the illus- 
trious inventor. The story of his visit to Syracuse, and 
his search for the tomb of Archimedes, is told by the 
Hon. R C. Winthrop in a lecture entitled Archimedes 
and Franklin, from which we quote as follows : 

Visit of Cicero to the Grave of Archimedes. 

" While Cicero was quaestor in Sicily— the first public 
office which he ever held, and the only one to which he 
was then eligible, being but just thirty years old— he 
paid a visit to Syracuse, then among the greatest cities 
of the world. The magistrates of the city of course 
waited on him at once, to offer their services in showing 
him the lions of the place, and requested him to specify 
anything which he would like particularly to see 

17* ' 



394 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Doubtless they supposed that he would ask immediately 
to be conducted to some one of their magnificent tem- 
ples, that he might behold and admire those splendid 
works of art with which— notwithstanding that Marcel- 
lus had made it his glory to carry not a few of them 
away with him for the decoration of the Imperial City 
—Syracuse still abounded, and which soon after tempted 
the cupidity, and fell a prey to the rapacity, of the in- 
famous Yerres. 

"Or, haply, they may have thought that he would 
be curious to see and examine the Ear of Dionysius, as 
it was called— a huge cavern, cut out of the solid rock 
in the shape of a human ear, two hundred and fifty feet 
long and eighty feet high, in which that execrable ty- 
rant confined ail persons who came within the range of 
his suspicion, and which was so ingeniously contrived 
and constructed that Dionysius, by applying his ear to 
a small hole, where the sounds were collected as upon 
a tympanum, could catch every syllable that was uttered 
in the cavern below, and could deal out his proscription 
and his vengeance accordingly upon all who might dare 
to dispute his authority or to complain of his cruelty. 
Or they may have imagined, perhaps, that he would be 
impatient to visit at once the sacred fountain of Arethu- 
sa, and the seat of those Sicilian Muses whom Virgil so 
soon after invoked in commencing that most inspired 
of all uninspired compositions, which Pope has so nobly 
paraphrased in his glowing and glorious Eclogue— the 

'Messiah.' § 5 

" To their, great astonishment, however, Cicero's first 
request was that they would take him to see the tomb 
of Archimedes. To his own still greater astonishment, 
as we may well believe, they told him in reply that they 
knew nothing about the tomb of Archimedes, and had 
no idea where it was to be found, and they even denied 



THE SICILIAN GREEKS. 395 

that any such tomb was still remaining among them. 
But Cicero understood perfectly well what he was talk- 
ing about. He remembered the exact description of the 
tomb. He remembered the very verses which had been 
inscribed on it. He remembered the sphere and the cyl- 
inder which Archimedes had himself requested to have 
wrought upon it, as the chosen emblems of his eventful 
life. And the great orator forthwith resolved to make 
search for it himself. Accordingly, he rambled out into 
the place of their ancient sepulchres, and, after a careful 
investigation, he came at last to a spot overgrown with 
shrubs and bushes, where presently he descried the top 
of a small column just rising above the branches. Upon 
this little column the sphere and the cylinder were at 
length found carved, the inscription was painfully de- 
ciphered, and the tomb of Archimedes stood revealed to 
the reverent homage of the illustrious Eoman quaestor. 

"This was in the year 76 before the birth of our 
Saviour. Archimedes died about the year 212 before 
Christ. One hundred and thirty -six years only had 
thus elapsed since the death of this celebrated person, 
before his tombstone was buried beneath briers and 
brambles, and before the place and even the existence 
of it were forgotten by the magistrates of the very city 
of which he was so long the proudest ornament in peace, 
and the most effective defender in war. What a lesson 
to human pride, what a commentary on human gratitude 
was here! It is an incident almost precisely like that 
which the admirable and venerable De. Watts imagined 
or imitated, as the topic of one of his most striking and 
familiar Lyrics : 



a i 



Theron, among his travels, found 
A broken statue on the ground ; 
And searching onward as he went, 
He traced a ruined monument. 



396 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Mould, moss, and shades had overgrown 

The sculpture of the crumbling stone ; 

Yet ere he passed, with much ado, 

He guessed and spelled out, Sci-pi-o. 

" Enough," he cried ; " I'll drudge no more 

In turning the dull Stoics o'er ; ' 
* * * * 

For when I feel my virtue fail, 
And my ambitious thoughts prevail, 
I'll take a turn among the tombs, 
And see whereto all glory comes. ,r 

I do not learn, however, that Cicero was cured of his 
eager vanity and his insatiate love of fame by this "turn r 
among the Syracusan tombs. He was then only just at 
the threshold of his proud career, and lie went back to 
pursue it to its bloody end with unabated zeal, and with 
an ambition only extinguishable with his life.' 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPEEMACY. 397 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 
I. THE SACKED WAR. 

Four years after the battle of Mantine'a the Grecian 
states again became involved in domestic hostilities, 
known as the Sacred War, the second in Grecian history 
to which that title was applied, the first having been 
carried on against the inhabitants of Crissa, on the 
northern shore of the Corinthian Gulf, in the time of 
Solon. The causes of this second Sacred War were briefly 
these: The Pho'cians, allies of Sparta against Thebes, 
had taken into cultivation a portion of the plain of 
Delphos, sacred to Apollo; and the Thebans caused 
them to be accused of sacrilege before the Amphicty- 
onic Council, which condemned them to pay a heavy 
fine. The Phocians refused obedience, and, encouraged 
by the Spartans, on whom a similar penalty had been 
imposed for their wrongful occupation of the Theban 
capital, they took up arms to resist the decree, and plun- 
dered the sacred Temple of Delphos to obtain means for 
carrying on the war. 

The Thebans, Thessa'lians, and nearly all the states of 
northern Greece leagued against the Phocians, while 
Athens and Sparta declared in their favor. After the 
war had continued five years a new power w r as brought 
forward on the theatre of Grecian history, in the person 
of Philip, who had recently established himself on the 
throne of Mac/edon, and to whom some of the Thessa- 
lians applied for aid against the Phocians. The inter- 
ference of Philip forms an important epoch in Grecian 



398 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

affairs. " The most desirable of all conditions for Greece 
would have been," says Thirlwall, "to be united in a 
confederacy strong enough to prevent intestine war- 
fare among its members, and so constituted as to guard 
against all unnecessary encroachment on their indepen- 
dence. But the time had passed by when the supremacy 
of any state could either have been willingly acknowl- 
edged by the rest, or imposed upon them by force; and 
the hope of any favorable change in the general condition 
of Greece was now become fainter than ever." Wasted 
by her internal dissensions, Greece was now about to 
suffer their natural results, and we interrupt our narra- 
tive to briefly trace the growth of that foreign power 
which, unexpectedly to Greece, became its master. 



II. SKETCH OF MACEDONIA. 

Macedon — or Macedonia— whose boundaries varied 
greatly at different times, had its south-eastern borders 
on the ^Egean Sea, while farther north it was bounded 
by the river Strymon, which separated it from Thrace, 
and on the south by Thessaly and Epirus. On the west 
Macedonia embraced, at times, many of the Illyrian 
tribes which bordered on the Adriatic. On the north 
the natural boundary was the mountain chain of Heb'- 
mus. The principal river of Macedonia was the Ax'ius 
(now the Vardar), which fell into the Thermaic Gulf, now 
called the Gulf of Salonica. 

The history of Macedonia down to the time of Philip, 
the father of Alexander the Great, is involved in much 
obscurity. The early Macedonians appear to have been 
an Illyrian tribe, different in race and language from the 
Hellenes or Greeks ; but Herodotus states that the Mace- 
donian monarchy was founded by Greeks from Argos; 
and, according to Greek writers, twelve or fifteen Gre- 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 399 

cian princes reigned there before the accession of Philip, 
who took charge of the government about the year 360 
B.C., not as monarch, but as guardian of the infant son 
of his elder brother. 

Philip had previously passed several years at Thebes 
as a hostage, where he eagerly availed himself of the 
excellent opportunities which that city afforded for the 
acquisition of various kinds of knowledge. He success- 
fully cultivated the study of the Greek language; and 
in the society of such generals and statesmen as Epami- 
nondas, Pelopidas, and their friends, became acquainted 
with the details of the military tactics of the Greeks, 
and learned the nature and working of their democrat- 
ical institutions. Thus, with the superior mental and 
physical endowments which nature had given him, he 
became eminently fitted for the part which he afterward 
bore in the intricate game of Grecian politics. 

After Philip had successfully defended the throne of 
Macedon during several years, in behalf of his nephew, 
his military successes enabled him to assume the kingly 
title, probably with the unanimous consent of both the 
army and the nation. He annexed several Thracian 
towns to his dominions, reduced the Illyrians and other 
nations on his northern and western borders, and was 
at times an ally, and at others an enemy, of Athens. 
At length, during the Sacred War against the Phoeians, 
the invitation which he received from the Thessalian 
allies of Thebes, as already noticed, afforded him a pre- 
text, which he had long coveted, for a more active in- 
terference in the affairs of his southern neighbors. 



III. INTERFERENCE OF PHILIP OF MACEDON. 

Of all the Grecian states, Athens alone had succeeded 
in regaining some of her former power, and she now 



400 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

became the leader in the struggle with Macedonia. In 
response to the invitation extended to him,- Philip en- 
tered Thessaly on his southern inarch, but was at first 
repulsed by the Phocians and their allies, and obliged 
to retire to his own territory. He soon returned, how- 
ever, at the head of a more numerous army, defeated 
the enemy in a decisive engagement near the Gulf of 
Pag'asge, and would have marched upon Phocis at once 
to terminate the war, but he found the Pass of Ther- 
mopylae strongly guarded by the Athenians, and thought 
it prudent to withdraw his forces. 

The Sacred "War still lingered, although the Phocians 
desired peace; but the revengeful spirit of the Thebans 
was not allayed, and Philip was again urged to crush 
the profaners of the national religion. It was at this 
period that the great Athenian orator, Demosthenes, 
came forward with the first of those orations against 
Philip and his supposed policy, which, from their sub- 
ject, received the name of "the Philippics "— a title 
since commonly given to any discourse or declamation 
abounding in acrimonious invective. The penetration 
of Demosthenes enabled him easily to divine the am- 
bitious plans of Philip, and as he considered him the 
enemy of the liberties of Athens and of Greece, he 
sought to rouse his countrymen against him. His dis- 
course was essentially practical. As a writer has said, 
"He alarms, but encourages his countrymen; points 
out both their weakness and their strength ; rouses them 
to a sense of danger, and shows the way to meet it ; 
recommends not any extraordinary efforts, for which at 
this moment there was no urgent necessity, but unfolds 
a scheme, simple and feasible, suiting the occasion, and 
calculated to lay the foundation of better things." 

In the following language he censures the indolence 
and supineness of the Athenians : 



THE MACEDONIAN" SUPKEMACY. 401 

The First Philippic of Demosthenes. 

" When, O my countrymen ! will you exert your 
vigor? "When roused by some event? "When forced 
by some necessity ? "What, then, are we to think of our 
present condition ? To freemen, the disgrace attending 
our misconduct is, in my opinion, the most urgent ne- 
cessity. Or, say, is it your sole ambition to wander 
through the public places, each inquiring of the other, 
'"What new advices?' Can anything be more new than 
that a man of Macedon should conquer the Athenians 
and give law to Greece? 'Is Philip dead? No, but 
he is sick.' 1 How are you concerned in these rumors? 
Suppose he should meet some fatal stroke ; you would 
soon raise up another Philip, if your interests are thus 
regarded. For it is not to his own strength that he so 
much owes his elevation as to our supineness. And 
should some accident affect him — should Fortune, who 
hath ever been more careful of the state than we our- 
selves, now repeat her favors (and may she thus crown 
them !) — be assured of this, that by being on the spot, 
ready to take advantage of the confusion, you will 
everywhere be absolute masters ; but in your present 
disposition, even if a favorable juncture should present 
you with Amphip'olis, 2 you could not take possession 
of it while this suspense prevails in your councils. 

" Some of you wander about crying, ' Philip hath 
joined with the Lacedemonians, and they are concerting 
the destruction of Thebes, and the dissolution of some 



1 Philip had received a severe wound, which was followed hy a fit of 
sickness; hence these rumors and inquiries of the Athenians. "Longi- 
nus quotes this whole passage as a beautiful instance of those pathetic 
figures which give life and force and energy to an oration." 

2 Amphipolis, a city of Thrace founded by the Athenians, had fallen 
into the hands of Philip after a siege, and the Athenians had nothing 
more at heart than its recovery. 



402 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

free states.' Others assure us that he has sent an em- 
bassy to the king ;* others, that he is fortifying places in 
Illyria. Thus we all go about framing our several stories. 
I do believe, indeed, Athenians, that he is intoxicated 
with his greatness, and does entertain his imagination 
with many such visionary prospects, as he sees no pow- 
er rising to oppose him, and is elated with his success. 
But I cannot be persuaded that he hath so taken his 
measures that the weakest among us know what he is 
next to do— for the silliest are those who spread these 
rumors. Let us dismiss such talk, and remember only 
that Philip is our enemy— that he has spoiled us of our 
dominions, that we have long been subject to his inso- 
lence, that whatever we expected to be done for us by 
others has proved against us, that all the resource left us 
is in ourselves, and that, if we are not inclined to carry 
our arms abroad, we may be forced to engage at home. 
Let us be persuaded of this, and then we shall come to 
a proper determination ; then we shall be freed from 
idle conjectures. We need not be solicitous to know 
what particular events will happen ; we need but be 
convinced that nothing good can happen unless yon 
attend to your duty, and are willing to act as becomes 

you. , . 

"As for me, never have I courted favor by speaking 
what I am not convinced is for your good ; and now I 
have spoken my whole mind frankly and unreservedly. 
I could have wished, knowing the advantage of good 
counsel to you, that I were equally certain of its advan- 
tage to the counsellor ; so should I have spoken with 
more satisfaction. Now, with an uncertainty of the 
consequence to myself, but with a conviction that you 
will benefit by following my advice, I freely protter it. 



i The King of Persia, generally called the king by the Greeks. 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 403 

And, of all those opinions which are offered for your 
acceptance, may that be chosen which will best advance 
the general weal." Leland's trans. 

The most prominent of the particular acts specified 
by Demosthenes as indispensable to the Athenian wel- 
fare, were the fitting out of a fleet of fifty vessels, to be 
kept ready to sail, at a moment's notice, to any exposed 
portion of the Athenian sea-coast; and the establishment 
of a permanent land force of twenty-two hundred men, 
one -fourth to be citizens of Athens. The expense was 
to be met by taxation, a system of which he also pre- 
sented for adoption. Me. Gkote says of the first Phi- 
lippic of Demosthenes : 

"It is not merely a splendid piece of oratory, em- 
phatic and forcible in its appeal to the emotions; bring- 
ing the audience, by many different roads, to the main 
conviction which the orator seeks to impress; profound- 
ly animated with genuine Pan-hellenic patriotism, and 
with the dignity of that pre-Grecian world now threat- 
ened by a monarch from without. It has other merits 
besides, not less important in themselves, and lying more 
immediately within the scope of the historian*! We find 
Demosthenes, yet only thirty years old — young in polit- 
ical life — and thirteen years before the battle of Chaero- 
ne'a, taking accurate measure of the political relations 
between Athens and Philip ; examining those relations 
during the past, pointing out how they had become ev- 
ery year more unfavorable, and foretelling the danger- 
ous contingencies of the future, unless better precau- 
tions were taken ; exposing with courageous frankness 
not only the past mismanagement of public men, but 
also those defective dispositions of the people them- 
selves wherein such mismanagement had its root; lastly, 
after fault found, adventuring on his own responsibility 



404 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

to propose specific measures of correction, and urging 
upon reluctant citizens a painful imposition of personal 
hardship as well as of taxation." 

Of course Demosthenes and his policy were opposed 
by a strong party, and his warnings and exhortations 
produced but little effect. The latter result was largely 
due to the position of the Athenian general and states- 
man Pho'cion— the last Athenian in whom these two 
functions were united— who generally acted with the 
peace-party. Unlike many prominent members of that 
party, however, Phocion was pure and patriotic in his 
motives, and a man of the strictest integrity. It was his 
unquestioned probity and his peculiar disinterestedness 
that gave him such influence with the people. As an 
orator, too, he commanded attention by his striking and 
pithy brevity. " He knew so well," says Grote, " on 
what points to strike, that his telling brevity, strength- 
ened by the weight of character and position, cut through 
the fine oratory of Demosthenes more effectively than 
any counter oratory from men like JEsehines." Demos- 
thenes was once heard to remark, on seeing Phocion rise 
to speak, " Here comes the pruner of my periods," 

As Mr. Grote elsewhere adds : " The influence of 
Phocion as a public adviser was eminently mischievous 
to Athens. All depended upon her will ; upon the ques- 
tion whether her citizens were prepared in their own 
minds to incur the expense and fatigue of a vigorous 
foreign policy— whether they would handle their pikes, 
open°their purses, and forego the comforts of home, for 
the maintenance of Grecian and Athenian liberty against 
a growing but not as yet irresistible destroyer. * * * 
Now, it was precisely at such a moment, and when such 
a question was pending, that the influence of the peace- 
loving Phocion was most ruinous. His anxiety that the 
citizens should be buried at home in their own sepul- 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 405 

chres — his despair, mingled with contempt, of his coun- 
trymen and their refined habits — his hatred of the ora- 
tors who might profit by an increased war expenditure — 
all contributed to make him discourage public effort, and 
await passively the preponderance of the Macedonian 
arms; thus playing the game of Philip, and siding, though 
himself incorruptible, with the orators in Philip's pay." ' 
As no measures of importance were taken to check 
the growing power of Philip, in the year 349 he at- 
tacked the Olynthians, who were in alliance with Ath- 
ens. They sent embassies to Athens, seeking aid, and 
Demosthenes supported their cause in the three " Olyn- 
thiac Orations," which roused the Athenians to more 
vigorous efforts. But the latter were divided in their 
counsels, and the aid they gave the Olynthians was in- 
efficient. In 347 Olynthus fell into the hands of Philip, 
who, having somewhat lulled the suspicions of the Athe- 
nians by proposals of an advantageous peace, marched 
into Phocis in 346, and compelled the enemy to surren- 
der at discretion. The Amphictyonic Council, with the 
power of Philip to enforce its decrees, doomed Phocis 
to lose her independence forever, to have her cities lev- 
elled with the ground, her population to be distributed 
in villages of not more than fifty dwellings, and to pay 
a yearly tribute of sixty talents to the temple until the 
full amount of the plundered treasure should be restored. 
Finally, the two votes that the Phocians had possessed in 
the council were transferred to the King of Macedon and 
his successors. 

IV. WAR WITH MACEDON. 

From an early period of his career Philip had aspired 
to the sovereignty of all Greece, as a secondary object 

1 "History of Greece," vol. xi., p. 278. 



406 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

that should prepare the way for the conquest of Per- 
sia, the great aim and end of all his ambitious proj- 
ects. The accession of power he had just acquired now 
induced him to exert himself, by negotiation and con- 
quest, to extend his influence on every side of his do- 
minions. Demosthenes had been sent by the Athenians 
into the Peloponnesus to counteract the intrigues of 
Philip there, and had openly accused him of perfidy. 
To repel this charge, as well as to secure farther influ- 
ence, if possible, Philip sent an embassy to Athens, 
headed by the orator Python. It was on this occasion 
that Demosthenes delivered his second "Philippic" (344 
b.c), addressing himself principally to the Athenian 
sympathizers with Philip, of whom the orator iEsehines 

was the leader. 

In his military operations Philip ravaged Ulyria, re- 
duced Thessaly more nearly to a Macedonian province, 
conquered a part of the Thracian territory, extended his 
power into Epi'rus and Acarna'nia, and would have 
gained a footing in E'lis and Acha'ia, on the western 
coast of Peloponnesus, had it not been for the watchful 
jealousy of Athens which Demosthenes finally succeeded 
in arousing. The first open rupture with the Athenians 
occurred while Philip was subduing the Grecian cities 
on the Thracian coast of the Hellespont, in what was 
called the Thracian Chersone'sus. As yet Macedon and 
Athens were nominally at peace, and Philip complained 
that the Athenians were attempting to precipitate a con- 
flict. He sent an embassy to -Athens, which gave occa- 
sion to the speech of Demosthenes, " On the Cherso- 
nese" (341 b.c). The rupture in the Chersonesus was 
followed by Athenian successes in Eubce'a, whither De- 
mosthenes had succeeded in having an expedition sent, 
and, finally, by the expulsion of Philip's forces from the 
Chersonesus. ' Soon after this (339 b.c.) the Amphicty- 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPKEMACY. 407 

onic Council, through the influence of the orator iEs- 
ehines, appointed Philip to conduct a war against Am- 
phis'sa, a Lo'crian town, that had been convicted of a 
sacrilege similar to that of the Phocians. 

THE SUCCESSES AND DEATH OF PHILIP. 

It was now that Philip first threw off the mask, and 
revealed his designs against the liberties of Greece. 
Hastily passing through Thrace at the head of a power- 
ful army, he suddenly seized and commenced fortifying 
Elated, the capital of Phocis, which was conveniently 
situated for commanding the entrance into Boeotia. In- 
telligence of this event reached Athens at night, and 
caused great alarm. At daybreak on the following 
morning the Senate of Five Hundred met, and the peo- 
ple assembled in the Pnyx. Suddenly waking, at last, 
from their dream of security, from which all the elo- 
quent appeals of Demosthenes had hitherto been unable 
fully to arouse them, the Athenians began to realize 
their danger. At the instance of the great orator they 
formed a treaty with the Thebans, and the two states 
prepared to defend themselves from invasion ; but most 
of the Peloponnesian states kept aloof through indiffer- 
ence, rather than through fear. 

When the Athenian and Theban forces marched forth 
to give Philip battle, dissensions pervaded their ranks ; 
for the spirit of Grecian liberty had already been extin- 
guished. They gained a minor advantage, however, in 
two engagements that followed ; but the decisive battle 
was fought in August of the year 338, in the plain of 
Chserone'a, in Boeotia. The hostile armies were nearly 
equal in numbers; but there w^as no Pericles, or Epam- 
inondas, to match the warlike abilities of Philip and the 
young prince Alexander, the latter of whom commanded 
a wing of the Macedonian army. The Grecian army 



408 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

was completely routed, and the event broke up the fee- 
ble combination against Philip, leaving each of the allied 
states at his mercy. He treated the Thebans with nmch 
severity, but he exercised a degree of leniency toward 
the Athenians whicli excited general surprise— offering 
them terms of peace which they would scarcely have 
ventured to propose to him. Now virtually master of 
Greece, he assembled a Congress of the Grecian states 
at Corinth, at which all his proposals were adopted ; war 
was declared against Persia, and Philip was appointed 
commander-in-chief of the Grecian and Macedonian 
forces. But while he was preparing for his great enter- 
prise he was assassinated, during the festivities attending 
the marriage of his daughter, by a young Macedonian of 
noble birth, in revenge for some private wrong. 



V. ACCESSION OF ALEXANDER THE GREAT. 

Alexander, the son of Philip, then at the age of 
twenty years, succeeded his father on the throne of 
Macedon. At once the Illyrians, Thracians, and other 
northern tribes took up arms to recover their independ- 
ence; bat Alexander quelled the revolt in a single cam- 
paign On the death of Philip, Demosthenes, who had 
been informed of the event by a special messenger, im- 
mediately took steps to incite Athens to shake oil the 
Macedonian yoke. In the words of a modern historian, 
"He resolved to avail himself of the superstition ot his 
fellow-citizens, by a pious fraud. He went to the sen- 
ate-house and declared to the Five Hundred that Jove 
and Athe'na had forewarned him in a dream of some 
great blessing that was in store for the Commonwealth. 
Shortly afterward public couriers arrived with the news 
of Philip's death. Demosthenes, although in mourning 
for the recent loss of an only daughter, now came abroad 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPKEMACY. 409 

dressed in white, and crowned with a chaplet, in which 
attire he was seen sacrificing at one of the public altars." 
He made vigorous preparations for action, and sent en- 
voys to the principal Grecian states to excite them 
against Macedon. Several of the states, headed by the 
Athenians and the Thebans, rose against the dominant 
oligarchy ; but Alexander, whose marches were unpar- 
alleled for their rapidity, suddenly appeared in their 
midst. Thebes was taken by assault ; six thousand of 
her warriors were slain ; the city was levelled with the 
ground, and thirty thousand prisoners were condemned 
to slavery. The other Grecian states hastily renewed 
their submission ; and Athens, with servile homage, 
sent an embassy to congratulate the } r oung king on his 
recent successes. Alexander accepted the excuses of all, 
and having intrusted the government of Greece and 
Macedon to Antip'ater, one of his generals, he set out 
on his career of Eastern conquest with only thirty-five 
thousand men, and a treasury of only seventy talents of 
silver. He had distributed nearly all the remaining 
property of his crown among his friends ; and when he 
was asked what he had reserved for himself, he an- 
swered, "My hopes" 



VI. ALEXANDER INVADES ASIA. 

Early in the spring of 334 Alexander crossed the 
Hellespont, and a few days later defeated a large Per- 
sian army on the eastern bank of the Grani'cus, with 
the loss on his part of only eighty-five horsemen and 
thirty light infantry. The gates of Sardis and Ephesus 
were next thrown open to him, and he was soon undis- 
puted master of all Asia Minor. Early in the following 
year he directed his march farther eastward, and on the 
coast of Cili'cia, near Issus, again met the Persian or 

18 



410 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

barbarian army, numbering over seven hundred thou- 
sand men, and commanded by Dari'us, the Persian king. 
Alexander, as usual, led his army in person, and achieved 
a splendid victory. The wife, daughters, and an infant 
son of Darius fell into the hands of the conqueror, and 
were treated by him with the greatest kindness and re- 
spect. Some time after, and just before his death, when 
Darius heard of the generous treatment of his wife, who 
was accounted the most beautiful woman in Asia— of her 
death from sudden illness, and of the magnificent burial 
she had received from the conqueror— he lifted up his 
hands to heaven and prayed that if his kingdom were to 
pass from himself, it might be transferred to Alexander. 
The conqueror now directed his march southward 
through northern Syria and Palestine, conquering Tyre 
after a vigorous siege of seven months. This was per- 
haps the greatest of Alexander's military achievements ; 
but it was tarnished by his cruelty toward the conquered. 
Exasperated by the long and desperate resistance of the 
besieged, he gave them no quarter. Eight thousand of 
the inhabitants are said to have been massacred, and 
thirty thousand were sold into slavery. After the fall 
of Tyre Alexander proceeded into Egypt, which he easily 
brought under subjection. After having founded the 
present city of Alexandria, at the mouth of the Nile, he 
returned to Palestine, crossed the Euphrates, and marched 
into the very heart of the Persian empire, declaring, " The 
world can no more admit two masters than two suns." 



VII. BATTLE OF ARBE'LA.-FLIGHT AND DEATH OF DARIUS. 

On a beautiful plain, twenty miles distant from the 
town of Arbela, the Persian monarch, surrounded by 
all the pomp and luxury of Eastern magnificence, had 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 411 

collected the remaining strength of his empire, consist- 
ing of an army of more than a million of infantry and 
forty thousand cavalry, besides two hundred scythed 
chariots, and fifteen elephants brought from the west of 
India. To oppose this immense force Alexander had 
only forty thousand infantry and seven thousand caval- 
ry. But his forces were well armed and disciplined, and 
were led by an able general who had never known de- 
feat. Darius sustained the conflict with better judg- 
ment and more courage than at Issus ; but the cool 
intrepidity of the Macedonians was irresistible, and the 
field of battle soon became a scene of slaughter, in which 
some say forty thousand, and others three hundred thou- 
sand, of the barbarians were slain, while the loss of 
Alexander did not exceed five hundred men. Although 
Darius escaped with a portion of his body -guard, the 
whole of the royal baggage and treasure was captured 
at Arbela. 

Now simply a fugitive, " with merely the title of 
king," Darius crossed the mountains into Media, where 
he remained six or seven months, and until the advance 
of Alexander in pursuit compelled him to pass through 
the Caspian Gates into Parthia. Here, on the near ap- 
proach of the enemy, he was murdered by Bessus, satrap 
of Bactria, because he refused to fly farther. " Within 
four years and three months from the time Alexander 
crossed the Hellespont," says Geote, " by one stupend- 
ous defeat after another Darius had lost all his Western 
empire, and had become a fugitive eastward of the 
Caspian Gates, escaping captivity at the hand of Alex- 
ander only to perish by that of the satrap Bessus. All 
antecedent historical parallels — the ruin and captivity 
of the Lydian Crce'sus, the expulsion and mean life of 
the Syracusan Dionysius, both of them impressive ex- 
amples of the mutability of human condition — sink into 



412 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

trifles compared with the overthrow of this towering 
Persian colossus. The orator ^Eschines expressed the 
genuine sentiment of a Grecian spectator when he ex- 
claimed (in a speech delivered at Athens shortly before 
the death of Darius) : 

" ' What is there among the list of strange and unex- 
pected events which has not occurred in our time ? Our 
lives have transcended the limits of humanity ; we are 
born to serve as a theme for incredible tales to posterity. 
Is not the Persian king — who dug through Athos and 
bridged the Hellespont, who demanded earth and water 
from the Greeks, who dared to proclaim himself, in 
public epistles, master of all mankind from the rising to 
the setting sun — is not he now struggling to the last, 
not for dominion over others, but for the safety of his 
own person?' 1 Such were the sentiments excited by 
Alexander's career even in the middle of 330 B.C., more 
than seven years before his death." 

Babylon and Susa, where the riches of the East lay 
accumulated, had meanwhile opened their gates to Al- 
exander, and thence he directed his march to Persepolis, 
the capital of Persia, which he entered in triumph. 
Here he celebrated his victories by a magnificent feast, 
at which the great musician Timo'theus, of Thebes, per- 
formed on the flute and the lyre, accompanied by a 
chorus of singers. Such was the wonderful power of 
his music that the whole company are said to have been 
swayed by it to feelings of love, or hate, or revenge, as 
if by the wand of a magician. The poet Drtden has 
given us a description of this feast in a poem that has 
been called by some " the lyric masterpiece of English 
poetry," and by others "an inspired ode." Though de- 
signed especially to illustrate the power of music, it is 



He speaks of both Xerxes and Darius as the Persian king. 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPKEMACY. 413 

based on historic facts. Only partial extracts from it 
can here be given. 

Alexander's Feast. 

'Tvvas at the royal feast, for Persia won 
By Philip's warlike son : 
Aloft in awful state 
The godlike hero sate 
On his imperial throne : 
His valiant peers were placed around, 
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound 

(So should desert in arms be crowned). 
The lovely Thais, by his side 
Sat, like a blooming Eastern bride, 
In flower of youth and beauty's pride. 
Happy, happy, happy pair ! 
None but the brave, 
None but the brave, 
None but the brave deserve the fair. 

In the second division of the poem Timo'theus is rep- 
resented as singing the praises of Jupiter, when the 
crowd, carried away by the enthusiasm with which the 
music had inspired them, proclaim Alexander a deity! 
The monarch accepts the adoration of his subjects, and 
"assumes the god." 

The list'ning crowd admire the lofty sound: 

" A present deity !" they shout around : 

" A present deity !" the vaulted roofs rebound. 

With ravished ears 

The monarch hears, 

Assumes the god, 

Affects to nod, 
And seems to shake the spheres. 

The praises of Bacchus and the joys of wine being 
next sung, the effects upon the king are described ; and 



414 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

when the strains had fired his soul almost to madness, 
Timotheus adroitly changes the spirit and measure of 
his song, and as successfully allays the tempest of pas- 
sion that his skill had raised. The effects of this change 
are thus described : 

Soothed with the sound, the king grew vain ; 
Fought all his battles o'er again ; 
And thrice he routed all his foes ; and thrice he slew the slain. 
The master saw the madness rise ; 
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes ; 
And, while he Heaven and Earth defied, 
Changed his hand, and checked his pride. 

He chose a mournful Muse, 

Soft pity to infuse ; 
He sung Darius, great and good, 

Bv too severe a fate, 
Fallen, fallen, fallen, fallen, 
Fallen from his high estate, 

And weltering in his blood ; 
Deserted at his utmost need, 
By those his former bounty fed ; 
On the bare earth exposed he lies, 
With not a friend to close his eyes. 
With downcast looks the joyless victor sat, 
Revolving in his altered soul 

The various turns of chance below ; 
And, now and then a sigh he stole, 
And tears began to flow. 

Under the soothing influence of the next theme, 
which is Love, Alexander sinks into a slumber, from 
which, however, a change in the music to discordant 
strains arouses him to feelings of revenge, as the singer 
draws a picture of the Furies, and of the Greeks "that 
in battle were slain." Then it was that Alexander, in- 
stigated by Thais, a celebrated Athenian beauty who ac- 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 415 

companied Lira on his expedition, set fire to the palace 
of Persepolis, intending to burn the whole city— " the 
wonder of the world." The poet compares Thais to 
Helen, whose fatal beauty caused the downfall of Troy, 
852 years before. 

Now strike the golden lyre again ; 
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain. 
Break his bands of sleep asunder, 
And rouse him, like a rattling peal of thunder. 
Hark ! hark ! the horrid sound 
Has raised up his head, 
As awaked from the dead, 
And, amazed, he stares around. 
Revenge ! revenge ! Timotheus cries, 
See the Furies arise ! 
See the snakes that they rear! 
How they hiss in their hair, 
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes ! 
Behold a ghastly band, 
Each a torch in his hand ! 
These are the Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain, 
And unburied remain, 
Inglorious on the plain : 
Give the vengeance due 
To the valiant crew, 
Behold how they toss their torches on high ! 
How they point to the Persian abodes, 
And glittering temples of their hostile gods ! 
The princes applaud with a furious joy ; 
And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to destroy ; 
Thais led the way, 
To light him to his prey, 
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy ! 

During four years Alexander remained in the heart 
of Persia, reducing to subjection the chiefs who still 



416 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

struggled for independence, and regulating the govern- 
ment of the conquered provinces. Ambitious of farther 
conquests, he passed the Indus, and invaded the country 
of the Indian king Po'rus, whom he defeated in a san- 
guinary engagement, and took prisoner. Alexander con- 
tinued his march eastward until he reached the Hyph'- 
asis, the most eastern tributary of the Indus, when his 
troops, seeing no end of their toils, refused to follow 
him farther, and he was reluctantly forced to abandon 
the career of conquest, which he had marked out for 
himself, to the Eastern ocean. He descended the Indus 
to the sea, whence, after sending a fleet with a portion 
of his forces around through the Persian Gulf to the 
Euphrates, he marched with the remainder of his army 
through the barren wastes of Gedro'sia, and after much 
suffering and loss once more reached the fertile prov- 
inces of Persia. 

VIII. THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER. 

For some time after his return Alexander's attention 
was engrossed with plans for organizing, on a perma- 
nent basis, the government of the mighty empire that 
he had won. Aiming to unite the conquerors and the 
conquered, so as to form out of both a nation indepen- 
dent alike of Macedonian and Persian prejudices, he 
married Stati'ra, the oldest daughter of Darius, and 
united his principal officers with Persian and Median 
women of the noblest families, while ten thousand of 
his soldiers were induced to follow the example of their 
superiors. But while he was occupied with these cares, 
and with dreams of future conquests, his career was sud- 
denly terminated by death. On setting out to visit 
Babylon, in the spring of 324, soon after the decease of 
an intimate friend — Hephaes'tion — whose loss caused a 
great depression of his spirits, he was warned by the 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 417 

magicians that Babylon would be fatal to him ; but he 
proceeded to the city to conclude his preparations for 
his next ambitious scheme — the subjugation of Arabia. 
Babylon was now to witness the consummation of his 
triumphs and of his life. " As in the last scene of some 
well-ordered drama," says a modern historian, " all the 
results and tokens of his great achievements seemed to 
be collected there to do honor to his final exit." Al- 
though his mind was actively occupied in plans of con- 
quest, he was haunted by gloomy forebodings and super- 
stitious fancies, and endeavored to dispel his melancholy 
by indulging freely in the pleasures of the table. Ex- 
cessive drinking at last brought to a crisis a fever which 
he had probably contracted in the marshes of Assyria, 
and which suddenly terminated his life in the thirty- 
third year of his age, and the thirteenth of his reign 
(323 b.c). He was buried in Babylon. From the Latin 
poet Lucan we take the following estimate of 

His Career and His Character. 

Here the vain youth, who made the world his prize, 
That prosperous robber, Alexander, lies : 
When pitying Death at length had freed mankind, 
To sacred rest his bones were here consigned : 
His bones, that better had been tossed and hurled, 
"With just contempt, around the injured world. 
But fortune spared the dead; and partial fate, 
For ages fixed his Pha'rian 1 empire's date. 

If e'er our long-lost liberty return, 
That carcass is reserved for public scorn ; 
Now it remains a monument confessed, 
How one proud man could lord it o'er the rest. 



1 Pharian. An allusion to the famous light-house, the P7iaros of Alex- 
andria, built by Ptolemy Philadelphus, son of Ptolemy Soter, who suc- 
ceeded Alexander in Egypt. 

18* 



418 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

To Macedon, a corner of the earth, 
The vast ambitious spoiler owed his birth : 
There, soon, he scorned his father's humbler reign, 
And viewed his vanquished Athens with disdain. 

Driven headlong on, by fate's resistless force, 
Through Asia's realms he took his dreadful course ; 
His ruthless, sword laid human nature waste, 
And desolation followed where he passed. 
Red Ganges blushed, and famed Euphrates' flood, 
With Persian this, and that with Indian blood. 

Such is the bolt which angry Jove employs, 
When, undistinguishing, his wrath destroys : 
Such to mankind, portentous meteors rise, 
Trouble the gazing earth, and blast the skies. 
Nor flame nor flood his restless rage withstand, 
Nor Syrts 1 unfaithful, nor the Libyan sand : 
•O'er waves unknown he meditates his way, 
And seeks the boundless empire of the sea. 

E'en to the utmost west he would have gone, 

Where Te'thys' 2 lap receives the setting sun ; 

Around each pole his circuit would have made, 

And drunk from secret Nile's remotest head, 

When Nature's hand his wild ambition stayed ; 

With him, that power his pride had loved so well, 

His monstrous universal empire, fell ; 

No heir, no just successor left behind, 

Eternal wars he to his friends assigned, 

To tear the world, and scramble for mankind. 

Lucan. Trans, by Rowe. 

The poet Juvenal, moralizing on the death of Alex- 
ander, tells us that, notwithstanding his illimitable am- 



i Syrts. Two gulfs— Syrtis Minor and Syrtis Major— on the northern 
coast of Africa, abounding in quicksands, and dangerous to navigation. 
2 Tethys, the fabled wife of Ocean, and daughter of Heaven and Earth. 



THE MACEDONIAN SUPREMACY. 419 

bition, the narrow tomb that he found in Babylon was 
sufficiently ample for the small body that had contained 
his mighty soul. 

One world sufficed not Alexander's mind ; 
Cooped up, he seemed in earth and seas confined, 
And, struggling, stretched his restless limbs about 
The narrow globe, to rind a passage out ! 
Yet, entered in the brick-built town, he tried 
The tomb, and found the straight dimensions wide. 
Death only this mysterious truth unfolds : 
The mighty soul, how small a body holds! 

Tenth Satire. Trans, by Dryden. 

The body of Alexander was removed from Babylon 
to Alexandria by Ptolemy Soter, one of his generals, sub- 
sequently King of Egypt, and was interred in a golden 
coffin. The sarcophagus in which the coffin was en- 
closed has been in the British Museum since 1802 — a 
circumstance to which Byron makes a happy allusion in 
the closing lines of the following verse : 

How vain, how worse than vain, at length appear 
The madman's wish, the Macedonian's tear ! 
He wept for worlds to conquer ; half the earth 
Knows not his name, or but his death and birth, 
And desolation ; while his native Greece 
Hath all of desolation, save its peace. 
He " wept for worlds to conquer !" he who ne'er 
Conceived the globe he panted not to spare ! 
With even the busy Northern Isle unknown, 
"Which, holds his urn, and never knew his throne. 



420 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

FROM THE DEATH OF ALEXANDER TO THE CONQUEST 
OF GREECE BY THE ROMANS. 

I. A RETROSPECTIVE GLANCE AT GREECE. 
PROSECUTION OF DEMOSTHENES. 

Turning now to the affairs of Greece, we find that, 
three years after Alexander entered Asia, the Spartans 
made a determined effort to throw off the Macedonian 
yoke. They were joined by most of the Peloponnesian 
states, but Athens took no part in the revolt. Although 
meeting with some successes at first, the Spartans were 
finally defeated with great slaughter by Antip'ater (331 
b.c), who had been left by Alexander in command of 
Greece and Macedonia. This victory, and Alexander's 
successes in the East, gave rise to active measures by 
the Macedonian party in Athens against Demosthenes, 
who was holding two public offices, and, by his ability and 
patriotism, was still doing great service to the state. The 
occasion of this prosecution was as follows : 

Soon after the disastrous battle of -Chserone'a, Ctes'i- 
phon, an Athenian citizen, proposed that a golden 
crown 1 should be bestowed upon Demosthenes, in the 
public theatre, on the occasion of the Dionysiac festival, 
as a reward for his patriotism and public services. The 
special service for which the reward was proposed was 

i It was customary with the Athenians, and some other Greeks also, to 
honor their most meritorious citizens with a chaplet of olive interwoven 
with gold, and this was called a "golden crown." 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 421 

the rebuilding of the walls of Athens by Demosthenes, 
partially at his own expense. After the Athenian Sen- 
ate had acquiesced in the measure, JEschines, the rival 
of Demosthenes, brought an accusation against Ctesiphon 
for a violation of the law, in that, among other things 
charged, it was illegal to crown an official intrusted with 
the public moneys before he had rendered an account 
of his office — a proceeding which prevented the carry- 
ing of Ctesiphon's proposal to the people for a final de- 
cision. Thus the matter slumbered during a period of 
six years, when it was revived by iEschines, who thought 
he saw, in the success of the Macedonian arms — on 
which all his personal and political hopes were staked — 
a grand opportunity to crush his great rival. He now, 
therefore, brought the charges against Ctesiphon to trial. 
Although the latter was the nominal defendant in the 
case, and Demosthenes was only his counsel, it was well 
understood that the real object of attack was Demosthe- 
nes himself, his whole policy and administration ; and a 
vast concourse of people flocked to Athens to hear the 
two most celebrated orators in the world. A jury of not 
less than five hundred, chosen from the citizens at large, 
was impanelled by the archon ; and before a dense and 
breathless audience the pleadings began. 

The Oration of jEschines against Ctesiphon. 

JEschines introduces his oration with the following 
brief exordium : " You see, Athenians, what forces are 
prepared, what numbers gathered and arrayed, what so- 
liciting through the assembly, by a certain party — and 
all this to oppose the fair and ordinary course of justice 
in the state. As to me, I stand here in firm reliance, 
first on the immortal gods, next on the laws and you, 
convinced that faction never can have greater weight 
with you than law and justice." 



422 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

After JEschines lias dwelt at length, and with great 
ability, upon the nature of the offence with which Ctesi- 
phon is charged, the laws applicable to it, and the sup- 
posed evasions of Demosthenes in his reply, he reads the 
decree of the senate in favor of the bestowment of the 
crown, in the following words: 

"And the herald shall make proclamation in the the- 
atre, in presence of the Greeks, that the community of 
Athens hath crowned him, on account of his virtue and 
magnanimity, and for his constant and inviolable at- 
tachment to the interests of the state, through the course 
of all his counsels and administration." 

This gives the orator the opportunity to enter upon 
an extended review of the public life and character of 
Demosthenes, in which he boldly charges him with cow- 
ardice in the battle of Chseronea, with bribery and fraud 
in his public administration, and declares him to have 
been the prime cause of innumerable calamities that had 
befallen his country. He says : 

"It is my part, as the prosecutor, to satisfy you on 
this point, that the praises bestowed on Demosthenes 
are false ; that there never was a time in which he even 
began as a faithful counsellor, far from persevering in 
any course of conduct advantageous to the state. * * 

"It remains that I produce some instances of his 
abandoned flattery. For one whole year did Demosthe- 
nes enjoy the honor of a senator ; and yet in all that 
time it never appears that he moved to grant precedency 
to any ministers ; for the first time— the only time— he 
conferred this distinction on the ministers of Philip ; he 
servilely attended, to accommodate them with his cush- 
ions and his carpets; by the dawn of- day he conducted 
them to the theatre, and, by his indecent and abandoned 
adulation, raised a universal uproar of derision. When 
they were on their departure toward Thebes, he hired 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 423 

three teams of mules, and conducted them in state into 
that city. Thus did he expose his country to ridicule. 

"And yet this abject, this enormous flatterer, when 
lie had been the first that received advice of Philip's 
death from the emissaries of Charide'mus, pretended a 
divine vision, and, with a shameless lie, declared that 
this intelligence had been conveyed to him, not by Char- 
idemus, but by Jupiter and Minerva. 1 Thus he dared 
to boast that these divinities, by whom he had sworn 
falsely in the day, had descended to hold communication 
with him in the night, and to inform him of futurity. 
Seven days had now scarcely elapsed since the death of 
his daughter when this wretch, before he had performed 
the usual rites of mourning — before he had duly paid 
her funeral honors — crowned his head with a chaplet, 
put on his white robe, made a solemn sacrifice in despite 
of law and decency; and this when he had lost his child, 
the first, the only child that had ever called him by the 
tender name of father. I say not this to insult his mis- 
fortunes ; I mean but to display his real character. For 
he who hates his children, he who is a bad parent, can- 
not possibly prove a good minister. He who is insensi- 
ble to that natural affection which should engage his 
heart to those who are most intimate and near to him, 
can never feel a greater regard to your welfare than to 
that of strangers. He who acts wickedly in private life 
cannot prove excellent in his public conduct; he who is 
base at home, can never acquit himself with honor when 
sent to a strange country in a public character. For it 
is not the man, but the scene that changes. * * * 

"Is not this, our state, the common refuge of the 
Greeks, once the great resort of all the ambassadors 
from the several cities sent to implore our protection as 

1 See page 408. 



424 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

their sure resource, now obliged to contend, not for sov- 
ereign authority, but for our native land ? And to these 
circumstances have we been gradually reduced, from 
that time when Demosthenes first assumed the adminis- 
tration. Well doth the poet Hesiod refer to such men, 
in one part of his works, where he points out the duty 
of citizens, and warns all societies to guard effectually 
against evil ministers. I shall repeat his words ; for I 
presume we treasured up the sayings of poets in our 
memory when young, that in our riper years we might 
apply them to advantage. 

" ' When one man's crimes the wrath of Heaven provoke, 
Oft hath a nation felt the fatal stroke. 
Contagion's blast destroys at Jove's command, 
And wasteful famine desolates the land. 
Or, in the field of war, her boasted powers 
Are lost, and earth receives her prostrate towers. 
In vain in gorgeous state her navies ride, 
Dashed, wrecked, and buried in the boist'rous tide.' 

"Take away the measure of these verses, consider 
only the sentiment, and you will fancy that you hear, 
not some part of Hesiod, but a prophecy of the admin- 
istration of Demosthenes ; for true it is, that both fleets 
and armies, and whole cities, have been completely de- 
stroyed by his administration. 

"Which, think ye, was the more worthy citizen— 
Themistocles, who commanded your fleet when you 
defeated the Persian in the sea-fight at Salamis, or this 
Demosthenes, who deserted from his post? Miltiades, 
who conquered the barbarians at Marathon, or this man? 
The chiefs who led back the people from Phy'le; Aris- 
tides, surnamed the Just, or Demosthenes ? ISTo ; by the 
powers of heaven, I deem the names of these heroes too 
noble to be mentioned in the same day with that of this 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 425 

savage ! And let Demosthenes show, when he comes to 
his reply, if ever a decree was made for granting a gold- 
en crown to them. Was then the state ungrateful? 
No ; but she thought highly of her own dignity. And 
these citizens, who were not thus honored, appear to 
have been truly worthy of such a state; for they im- 
agined that they were not to be honored by public rec- 
ords, but by the memories of those they had obliged ; 
and their honors have there remained, from that time 
down to this day, in characters indelible and immortal. 
There were citizens in those days who, being stationed 
at the river Strymon, there patiently endured a long 
series of toils and dangers, and at length gained a 
victory over the Medes. At their return they peti- 
tioned the people for a reward ; and a reward was con- 
ferred upon them (then deemed of great importance) 
by erecting three memorials of stone in the usual por- 
tico, on which, however, their names were not inscribed, 
lest this might seem a monument erected to the honor 
of the commanders, not to that of the people. For the 
truth of this I appeal to the inscriptions. That on the 
first statue was expressed thus : 



a i 



Great souls! who fought near Strymon's rapid tide, 
And braved the invader's arm, and quelled his pride, 
Ei'on's high towers confess' d the glorious deed, 
And saw dire famine waste the vanquished Mede. 
Such was our vengeance on the barb'rous host, 
And such the generous toils our heroes boast.' 



" This was the inscription on the second : 



a < 



This the reward which grateful Athens gives ! 
Here still the patriot and the hero lives ! 
Here let the rising age with rapture gaze, 
And emulate the glorious deeds they praise.' 



426 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" On the third was the inscription : 

" ' Mnes'the-us hence led forth his chosen train, 
And poured the war o'er hapless Ilion's plain. 
'Twas his (so speaks the bard's immortal lay) 
To form the embodied host in firm array. 
Such were our sons ! Nor yet shall Athens yield 
The first bright honors of the sanguine field. 
Still, nurse of heroes ! still the praise is thine, 
Of every glorious toil, of every art divine.' 

" In these do we find the name of the general? No ; 
but that of the people. Fancy yourselves transported to 
the grand portico ; for, in this your place of assembling, 
the monuments of all great actions are erected in full 
view. There we find a picture of the battle of ^Mara- 
thon. Who was the general in this battle? To this 
question you will all answer— Miltiades. And yet his 
name is not inscribed. How? Did he not petition for 
such an honor ? He did petition ; but the people refused 
to grant it. Instead of inscribing his name, they con- 
sented that he should be drawn in the foreground, en- 
couraging his soldiers. In like manner, in the temple 
of thegreat Mother adjoining the senate-house, you may 
see the honors paid to those who brought our exiles back 
from Phyle ; nor were even these granted precipitately, 
but after an exact previous examination by the senate 
into the numbers of those who maintained their post 
there, when the Lacedaemonians and the Thirty marched 
to attack them— not of those who fled from their post 
at Chseronea on the first appearance of an enemy." 

^Eschines closes his very able and brilliant oration 
with the following words : 

« And now bear witness for me, thou Earth, thou 
Sun O Virtue and Intelligence, and thou, O Erudition, 
which teachest us the just distinction between vice and 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 427 

goodness, that I have stood up, that I have spoken in 
the cause of justice. If I have supported my prose- 
cution with a dignity befitting its importance, I have 
spoken as my wishes dictated ; if too deficiently, as my 
abilities admitted. Let what hath now been offered, 
and what your own thoughts must supply, be duly 
weighed, and pronounce such a sentence as justice and 
the interests of the state demand." 

Trans, by Thomas Leland, D.D. 

^Eschines was immediately followed by Demosthenes 
in a reply which has been considered "the greatest 
speech of the greatest orator in the world." The his- 
torian Grote speaks of "the encomiums which have 
been pronounced upon it with one voice, both in ancient 
and modern times, as the unapproachable masterpiece 
of Grecian oratory." It has been styled, from the oc- 
casion on which it was delivered, 

The Oration of Demosthenes on the Crown, 

The orator opens his defence against the charges 
brought forward by his adversary with the following 
exordium, which Quintil/ian commends for its modesty: 

" I begin, men of Athens, by praying to every god 
and goddess that the same good-will which I have ever 
cherished toward the Commonwealth, and all of you, 
may be requited to me on the present trial. I pray 
likewise — and this specially concerns yourselves, your 
religion, and your honor — that the gods may put it in 
your minds, not to take counsel of my opponent touch- 
ing the manner in which I am to be heard 1 — that would 
indeed be cruel ! — but of the laws and of your oath ; 

1 ^Eschines had requested that Demosthenes should be ."confined to 
the same method in his defence " which he, iEschines, had pursued in his 
charges against him. 



428 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

wherein (besides the other obligations) it is prescribed 
that you shall hear both sides alike. This means, not 
only that you must pass no pre-condemnation, not only 
that you must extend your good-will equally to both, 
but also that you must allow the parties to adopt such 
order and course of defence as they severally choose 

and prefer. 

"Many advantages hath JEschines over me on this 
trial; and two especially, men of Athens. First, our 
risk in the contest is not the same. It is assuredly not 
the same for me to forfeit your regard as for my ad- 
versary not to succeed in his indictment. To me — but 
I will say nothing untoward at the outset of my address. 
The prosecution, however, is play to him. My second 
disadvantage is the natural disposition of mankind to 
take pleasure in hearing invective and accusation, and 
to be annoyed by them who praise themselves. To 
^Eschines is assigned the part which gives pleasure; 
that which is (I may fairly say) offensive to all, is left 
for me. And if, to escape from this, I make no men- 
tion of what I have done, I shall appear to be without 
defence against his charges, without proof of my claims 
to honor ; whereas, if I proceed to give an account of 
my conduct and measures, I shall be forced to speak 
frequently of myself. I will endeavor, then, to do so 
with becoming modesty. What I am driven to by the 
necessity of the case will be fairly chargeable to my 
opponent, who has instituted such a prosecution. 

"I think, men of the jury, you will all agree that I, 
as well as Ctesiphon, am a party to this proceeding, and 
that it is a matter of no less concern to me than to him. 
It is painful and grievous to be deprived of anything, 
especially by the act of one's enemy ; but your good-will 
and affection are the heaviest loss precisely as they are 
the greatest prize to gain. * * * 



FKOM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 429 

" Had iEschines confined his charge to the subject of 
the prosecution, I too would have proceeded at once to 
my justification of the decree. 1 But since he has wasted 
no fewer words in the discussion, in most of them calum- 
niating me, I deem it both necessary and just, men of 
Athens, to begin by shortly adverting to these points, that 
none of you may be induced by extraneous arguments to 
shut your ears against my defence to the indictment. 

" To all his scandalous abuse about my private life 
observe my plain and obvious answer. If you know me 
to be such as he alleged — for I have lived nowhere else 
but among you — let not my voice be heard, however 
transcendent my statesmanship. Rise up this instant 
and condemn me. But if, in your opinion and judg- 
ment, I am far better and of better descent than my ad- 
versary ; if (to speak without offence) I am not inferior, 
I or mine, to any respectable citizens, then give no credit 
to him for his other statements ; it is plain they were all 
equally fictions ; but to me let the same good-will which 
you have uniformly exhibited upon many former trials 
be manifested now. With all your malice, ^Eschines, it 
was very simple to suppose that I should turn from the 
discussion of measures and policy to notice your scandal. 
I will do no such thin^. I am not so crazed. Your lies 
and calumnies about my political life I will examine 
forthwith. For that loose ribaldry I shall have a word 
hereafter, if the jury desire to hear it. * * * 

" If the crimes which ^Eschines saw me committing 
against the state were as heinous as he so tragically gave 
out, he ought to have enforced the penalties of the law 
against them at the time ; if he saw me guilty of an im- 
peachable offence, by impeaching and so bringing me to 
trial before you ; if moving illegal decrees, by indicting 

1 The decree of the senate procured by Ctesiphon in favor of Demos- 
thenes. 



430 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

me for them. For surely, if be can indict Ctesiphon on 
my account, he would not have forborne to indict me 
myself had he thought he could convict me. In short, 
whatever else he saw me doing to your prejudice, 
whether mentioned or not mentioned in his catalogue 
of slander, there are laws for such things, and trials, and 
judgments, with sharp and severe penalties, all of which 
he might have enforced against me; and, had he done 
so— had he thus pursued the proper method with me— 
his charges would have been consistent with his conduct. 
But now he has declined the straightforward and just 
course, avoided all proofs of guilt at the time, and after 
this long interval gets up to play his part withal— a heap 
of accusation, ribaldry, and scandal. Then he arraigns 
me but prosecutes the defendant. His hatred ol me 
he makes the prominent part of the whole contest ; yet, 
without having ever met me upon that ground, he 
openly seeks to deprive a third party of his privileges. 
Now, men of Athens, besides all the other arguments 
that may be urged in Ctesiphon's behalf, this, methinks, 
may very fairly be alleged-that we should try our quar- 
rel by ourselves ; not leave our private dispute and look 
what third party we can damage. That, surely, were the 

height of injustice." m 

Demosthenes now enters upon an elaborate review ot 
the history of Athens from the beginning of the Pho- 
cian war, his own relations thereto, and the charges of 
^Eschines in connection therewith, fortifying his defence 
with numerous citations from public documents, and 
boldly arraigning the political principles and policy of 
his opponent, whom he accuses of being in frequent 
communication with the emissaries of Philip— "a spy 
by nature, and an enemy to his country." In the fol- 
lowing terms he speaks of his own public services, and 
reminds iEschines that the people do not forget them : 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 431 

"Many great and glorious enterprises has the Com- 
monwealth, iEschines, undertaken and succeeded in 
through me ; and she did not forget them. Here is 
the proof. On the election of a person to speak the fu- 
neral oration immediately after the event, you were pro- 
posed ; but the people would not have you, notwith- 
standing your fine voice; nor Dema'des, though he had 
just made the peace ; nor He-ge'mon, nor any other of 
your party — but me. And when you and Pyth'ocles 
came forward in a brutal and shameful manner (oh, mer- 
ciful Heaven !) and urged the same accusations against 
me which you now do, and abused me, they elected me 
all the more. The reason — you are not ignorant of it, 
yet I will tell you. The Athenians knew as well the 
loyalty and zeal with which I conducted their affairs as 
the dishonesty of you and your party ; for what you de- 
nied upon oath in our prosperity you confessed in the 
misfortunes of the republic. They considered, therefore, 
that men who got security for their politics by the pub- 
lic disasters had been their enemies long before, and 
were then avowedly such. They thought it right, also, 
that the person who was to speak in honor of the fallen, 
and celebrate their valor, should not have sat under the 
same roof or at the same table with their antagonists ; 
that he should not revel there and sing a pgean over the 
calamities of Greece in company with their murderers, 
and then come here and receive distinction ; that he 
should not with his voice act the mourner of their fate, 
but that he should lament over them with his heart. 
And such sincerity they found in themselves and me, 
but not in any of you: therefore they elected me, and 
not you. Nor, wdiile the people felt thus, did the fathers 
and brothers of the deceased, who w 7 ere chosen by the 
people to perform their obsequies, feel differently. For 
having to order the funeral (according to custom) at the 



432 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

house of the nearest relative of the deceased, they or- 
dered it at mine— and with reason : because, though each 
to his own was nearer of kin than I was, no one was 
so near to them all collectively. He that had the deep- 
est interest in their safety and success must surely feel 
the deepest sorrow at their unhappy and unmerited mis- 
fortune. Eead the epitaph inscribed upon their monu- 
ment by public authority. In this, ^Eschines, you will 
find a proof of your absurdity, your malice, your aban- 
doned baseness. Bead ! 

The JZpitaph. 

" ' These are the patriot brave who, side by side, 

Stood to their arms and dashed the f oeman's pride : 
Firm in their valor, prodigal of life, 
Hades they chose the arbiter of strife ; 
That Greeks might ne'er to haughty victors bow, 
Nor thraldom's yoke, nor dire oppression know, 
They fought, they bled, and on their country's breast 
(Such was the doom of Heaven) these warriors rest : 
Gods never lack success, nor strive in vain, 
But man must suffer what the Fates ordain.' 

"Do you hear, ^Eschines, in this very inscription, that 
'the gods never lack success, nor strive in vain?' Not 
to the statesman does it ascribe the power of giving vic- 
tory in battle, but to the gods. But one thing, O Athe- 
nians, surprised me more than ail-that, when ^Eschines 
mentioned the late misfortunes of the country, he felt 
not as became a well-disposed and upright citizen ; he 
shed no tear, experienced no such emotion : with a loud 
voice, exulting and straining his throat, he imagined ap- 
parently that he was accusing me, while he was giving 
proof against himself that our distresses touched him 

not. * •* * 

"Two things, men of Athens, are characteristic of a 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 433 

well-disposed citizen ; so may I speak of myself and give 
the least offence. In authority his constant aim should 
be the dignity and pre-eminence of the Commonwealth ; 
in all times and circumstances his spirit should be loyal. 
This depends upon nature ; power and might upon other 
things. Such a spirit, you will find, I have ever sin- 
cerely cherished. Only see ! When my person was de- 
manded—when they brought Amphictyonic suits against 
me — when they menaced — when they promised — when 
they set these miscreants like wild beasts upon me — 
never in any way have I abandoned my affection for 
you. From the very beginning I chose an honest and 
straightforward course in politics, to support the honor, 
the power, the glory of my fatherland ; these to exalt, in 
these to have my being. I do not walk about the mar- 
ket-place gay and cheerful because the stranger has pros- 
pered, holding out my right hand and congratulating 
those who I think will report it yonder, and on any 
news of our own success shudder and groan and stoop 
to the earth like these impious men who rail at Athens, 
as if in so doing they did not rail at themselves; who 
look abroad, and if the foreigner thrives by the distresses 
of Greece, are thankful for it, and say we should keep 
him so thriving to all time. 

" Never, O ye gods, may those wishes be confirmed 
.by you! If possible, inspire even in these men a better 
sense and feeling! But if they are indeed incurable, 
destroy them by themselves; exterminate them on land 
and sea ; and for the rest of us, grant that we may speed- 
ily be released from our present fears, and enjoy a last- 
ing deliverance." 1 Trans, by Charles Rann Kennedy. 

i Lord Brougham says that "the music of this closing passage (in the 
original) is almost as tine as the sense is impressive and grand, and the 
manner dignified and calm," and he admits the difficulty of preserving 
this in a translation. His own translation of the passage is as follows : 
"Let not, O gracious God, let not such conduct receive any measure of 

19 



434 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

- . iEschines lost his case, and, not having obtained a 
fifth part of the votes, became himself liable to a pen- 
alty, and soon left the country in disgrace. 



II. THE WARS THAT FOLLOWED ALEXANDER'S DEATH. 

When the intelligence of Alexander's death reached 
Greece the country was already on the eve of a revolu- 
tion against Antip'ater. Athens found little difficulty 
in uniting several of the states with herself in a confed- 
eracy against him, and met with some successes in what 
is known as the J^/mian war. But the movement was 
short-lived, as AntipateTcompletely annihilated the con- 
federate army in the battle of Cran'non (322 B.C.). Ath- 
ens was directed to abolish her democratic form of gov- 
ernment, pay the expenses of the war, and surrender a 
number of her most famous men, including Demosthe- 
nes. The latter, however, escaped from Athens, and 
sought refuge in the Temple of Poseidon, in the island of 
Calaure'a. Here he took poison, and expired as he was 
beino- led from the temple by a satellite of Antipater. 

The sudden death of Alexander left the government 
in a very unsettled condition. As he had appointed no 
successor, immediately following his death a council of 
his generals was held, and the following division of 
his conquests was agreed upon: Ptolemy Soter was to 
have Egypt and the adjacent countries; Macedonia and 
Greece were divided between Antipater and Crat'erus; 
Antig'onus was given Phrygia, Lycia, and Pamphyria; 
Lysim'achus was granted T hrace; and Eume'nes was 

sanction from thee ! Rather plant even in these men a better spirit and 
better feelings ! But if they are wholly incurable, then pursue them, yea, 
themselves by themselves, to utter and untimely perdition, by land and 
by sea ; and to us who are spared, vouchsafe to grant the speediest rescind 
from our impending alarms, and an unshaken security." 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 435 

given Cappadocia and Paphlagonia. Soon after this di- 
vision Perdic'cas, then the most powerful of the gener- 
als who retained control in the East, and had the cus- 
tody of the infant Alexander, proclaimed himself regent, 
and at once set out on a career of conquest. Antigonus, 
Antipater, Craterus, and Ptolemy leagued against him, 
however, and in 321, after an unsuccessful campaign in 
Egypt, Perdiccas was murdered by his own officers. 

Antipater died in 318, and shortly after his death his 
son Cassander made himself master of Greece and Mac- 
edon, and caused the surviving members of Alexander's 
family to be put to death. Antigonus had, before this 
time, conquered Eumenes, and overrun Syria and Asia 
Minor ; but his increasing power led Ptolemy, Seleu'cus, 
Lysimachus, and Cassander to unite against him ; and 
they fought with him the famous battle of Ipsus, in 
Phrygia, that ended in the death of Antigonus and the 
dissolution of his empire (301 B.C.). A new partition of 
the country was now made into four independent king- 
doms: Ptolemy was given Egypt and Libya; Seleucus 
received the countries embraced in the eastern conquests 
of Alexander, and the whole region between the coast 
of Syria and the river Euphrates ; Lysimachus received 
the northern and western portions of Asia Minor, and 
Cassander retained the sovereignty of Greece and Mac- 
edon. 

Of these kingdoms the most powerful were Syria and 
Egypt; the former of which continued under the dy- 
nasty of the Seleucidse, and the latter under that of the 
Ptolemies, until both were absorbed by the Roman em- 
pire. Of all the Ptolemies, Ptolemy Philadelphus was 
the most eminent. He was not only a sovereign of abil- 
ity, but was also distinguished for his amiable qualities 
of mind, for his encouragement of the arts and com- 
merce, and he was called the richest and most powerful 



436 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

monarch of his age. He was born in 309 B.C. and died 
in 247. The Greek poet Theocritus, who lived much 
at his court, thus characterizes him : 

What is Ins character ? A royal spirit 

To point out genius and encourage merit.; 

The poet's friend, humane and good and kind ; 

Of manners gentle, and of generous mind. 

He marks his friend, but more he marks his foe ; 

His hand is ever ready to bestow : 

Request with reason, and he'll grant the thing, 

And what he gives, he gives it like a king. 

The poet then sings the praises of the king, and de- 
scribes the strength, the wealth, and the magnificence 
of his kingdom, in the following striking lines : 

Here, too, O Ptolemy, beneath thy sway 
What cities glitter to the beams of day ! 
Lo ! with thy statelier pomp no kingdom vies, 
While round thee thrice ten thousand cities rise. 
Struck by the terror of thy flashing sword, 
Syria bowed down, Arabia called thee Lord ; 
Phoenicia trembled, and the Libyan plain, 
With the black Ethiop, owned thy wide domain: 
E'en Lesser Asia and her isles grew pale 
As o'er the billows passed thy crowd of sail. 

Earth feels thy nod, and all the subject sea ; 
And each resounding river rolls for thee. 
And while, around, thy thick battalions flash, 
Thy proud steeds neighing for the warlike clash — 
Through all thy marts the tide of commerce flows, 
And wealth beyond a monarch's grandeur glows. 
Such gold-haired Ptolemy ! whose easy port 
Speaks the soft polish of the mannered court ; 
And whose severer aspect, as he wields 
The spear, dire-blazing, frowns in tented fields. 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 437 

And though he guards, while other kingdoms own 

His conquering arms, the hereditary throne, 

Yet in vast heaps no useless treasure stored 

Lies, like the riches of an emmet's hoard ; 

To mio-htv kino-s his bountv he extends, 

To states confederate and illustrious friends. 

No bard at Bacchus' festival appears, 

Whose lyre has power to charm the ravished ears, 

But he bright honors and rewards imparts, 

Due to his merits, equal to his arts ; 

And poets hence, for deathless song renowned, 

The generous fame of Ptolemy resound. 

At what more glorious can the wealthy aim 

Than thus to purchase fair and lasting fame ? 

Trans, by Fawkes. 

Cassander survived the establishment of his power in 
Greece only four years, and as his sons quarrelled over 
the succession, Demetrius, son of Antigonus, seized the 
opportunity to interfere in their disputes, cut off the 
brother who had invited his aid, and made himself mas- 
ter of the throne of Macedon, which was held by him 
and his posterity, except during a brief interruption 
after his death, down to the time of the Roman Con- 
quest. For a number of years succeeding the death of 
Demetrius, Macedon, Greece, and western Asia were har- 
assed with the wars excited by the various aspirants 
to power; and in this situation of affairs a storm, unseen 
in the distance, but that had long been gathering, sud- 
denly burst upon Macedon, threatening to convert, by 
its ravages, the whole Grecian peninsula into a scene of 
desolation. 

III. THE CELTIC INVASION, AND THE WAR W T ITH PYRRHUS. 

A vast horde of Celtic barbarians had for some time 
been collecting around the head-waters of the Adriatic, 



438 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Influenced by hopes of plunder they now overran Mace- 
don to the borders of Thessaly, defeating Ptolemy Ce- 
raunus, then King of Macedonia, in a great battle. The 
walled towns alone held out until the storm had spent 
its fury, when the Celts gradually withdrew from a coun- 
try in which there was but little left to tempt their 
cupidity. But in the following year (279 b.c.) another 
band of them, estimated at over two hundred thousand 
men, overran Macedonia, passed through Thessaly, de- 
feated the allied Grecians at Thermopylae, and then 
marched into Phocis, for the purpose of plundering the 
treasures of Delphi. But their atrocities aroused against 
them the whole population, and only a remnant of them 
gained their original seats on the Adriatic. 

The throne of Macedon now found an enemy in Pyr- 
rhus, King of Epirus, a connection of the royal family 
of Macedon, and of whose exploits Eoman history fur- 
nishes a full account. A desultory contest was main- 
tained for several years between Pyrrhus and Antigo- 
nus II., the son of Demetrius, and then King of Mace- 
don. While Pyrrhus was engaged in this war, Cleon'- 
ymus, of the blood royal of Sparta, who had been ex- 
cluded from the throne by the Spartan people, to give 
place to A'reus, invited Pyrrhus to his aid. Pyrrhus 
marched to Sparta, and, supposing that he should not 
meet with any resistance, ordered his tents to be pitched, 
and sat quietly down before the city. Night coming on, 
the Spartans in consternation met in council, and re- 
solved to send their women to Crete for safety. There- 
upon the women assembled and remonstrated against it ; 
and the queen, Archidami'a, being appointed to speak for 
the rest, went into the council-hall with a sword in her 
hand, and boldly upbraiding thennen, told them they 
did their wives great wrong if they thought them so 
faint-hearted as to live after Sparta was destroyed. The 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 439 

women then rushed to the defences of the city, and 
spent the night aiding the men in digging trenches ; 
and when Pyrrhns attacked on the morrow, he was so 
severely repulsed that he soon abandoned the siege and 
retired from Laconia. The patriotic spirit and heroism 
of the Spartan women on this occasion are well charac- 
terized in the following lines : 

Queen Archidami'a. 

The chiefs were met in the council-hall ; 

Their words were sad and few, 
They were ready to fight, and ready to fall, 

As the sons of heroes do. 

• 

And moored in the harbor of Gyth'e-um lay 

The last of the Spartan fleet, 
That should bear the Spartan women away 

To the sunny shores of Crete. 

Their hearts went back to the days of old ; 

They thought of the world-wide shock, 
When the Persian hosts like an ocean rolled 

To the foot of the Grecian rock ; 

And they turned their faces, eager and pale, 

To the rising roar in the street, 
As if the clank of the Spartan mail 

Were the tramp of the conqueror's feet. 

It was Archidamia, the Spartan queen, 

Brave as her father's steel ; 
She stood like the silence that comes between 

The flash and the thunder-peal. 

She looked in the eyes of the startled crowd ; 

Calmly she gazed around ; 
Her voice was neither low nor loud, 

But it rang like her sword on the ground. 



440 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" Spartans !" she said — and her woman's face 
Flushed out both pride and shauie — 

" I ask, by the memory of your race, 
Are ye worthy of the name ? 

" Ye have bidden us seek new hearths and graves, 

Beyond the reach of the foe ; 
And now, by the dash of the blue sea-waves, 

We swear that we will not go ! 

"Is the name of Pyrrhus to blanch your cheeks? 

Shall he burn, and kill, and destroy ? 
Are ye not sons of the deathless Greeks 

Who fired the gates of Troy ? 

" What though his feet have scathless stood 

In the rush of the Punic foam ? 
Though his sword be red to its hilt with the blood 

That has beat at the heart of Rome ? 

" Brothers and sons ! we have reared you men : 

Our walls are the ocean swell ; 
Our winds blew keen down the rocky glen 

Where the staunch Three Hundred fell. 

" Our hearts are drenched in the wild sea-flow, 
In the light of the hills and the sky ; # 

And the Spartan women, if need be so, 
Will teach the men to die. 

" We are brave men's mothers, and brave men's wives 

We are ready to do and dare ; 
We are ready to man your walls with our lives, 

And string your bows with our hair. 

"Let the young and brave lie down to-night, 

And dream of the brave old dead, 
Their broad shields bright for to-morrow's fight, 

Their swords beneath their head. 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 441 

"Our breasts are better than bolts and bars ; 

We neither wail nor weep ; 
We will lio-ht our torches at the stars, 

And work while our warriors sleep. 

" We hold not the iron in our blood 

Viler than strangers' gold ; 
The memorv of our motherhood 

Is not to be bought and sold. 

" Shame to the traitor heart that springs 

To the faint soft arms of Peace, 
If the Roman eagle shook his wings 

At the very gates of Greece ! 

"Ask not the mothers who gave you birth 

To bid you turn and flee ; 
When Sparta is trampled from the earth 

Her women can die, and be free." 

Soon after the repulse at Sparta, Pyrrhus again 
marched against Antig'onus ; but having attacked Argos 
on the way, and after having entered within the walls, 
he was killed by a tile thrown by a poor woman from 
a house-top. The death of Pyrrhus forms an important 
epoch in Grecian history, as it put an end to the strug- 
gle for power among Alexander's successors in the West, 
and left the field clear for the final contest between the 
liberties of Greece and the power of Macedon. Autig- 
onus now made himself master of the greater part of 
Peloponnesus, and then sought to reduce Athens, the 
defence of which was aided by an Egyptian fleet and a 
Spartan army. Athens was at length taken (262 B.C.), 
and all Greece, with the exception of Sparta, seemed to 
lie helpless at the feet of Antigonus, who little dreamed 
that the league of a few Achaean cities was to become a 
formidable adversary to him and his house. 

19* 



442 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

IV. THE ACH^'AN LEAGUE. -PHILIP V. OF MACEDON. 

The Achaean League at first comprised twelve towns 
of Acha'ia, which were associated together for mutual 
safety, forming a little federal republic. But about 
twenty years after the death of Pyrrhus other cities 
gave in their adherence, until the confederacy embraced 
nearly the whole of the Peloponnesus. Athens had 
been "reduced to great misery by Antigonus, and was in" 
no condition to aid the League, while Sparta vigorously 
opposed it, and finally succeeded in inducing Corinth 
and Argos to withdraw from it. Sparta subsequently 
made war against the Achaeans, and by her successes com- 
pelled them to call in the aid of the Macedonians, their 
former enemies. Antigonus readily embraced this op- 
portunity to restore the influence of his family in 
southern Greece, and, marching against the Lacedaemo- 
nians, he obtained a decisive victory which placed Sparta 
at his mercy ; but he used his victory moderately, and 
granted the Spartans peace on liberal terms (221 b.c). 

Antigonus died soon after this success, and was suc- 
ceeded by his nephew and adopted son, Philip V-, a 
youth of only seventeen. The JEto'lians, a confederacy 
of rude Grecian tribes, aided by the Spartans, now be- 
gan a series of unprovoked aggressions on some of the 
Peloponnesian states. The Messenians, whose territory 
they had invaded by way of the western coast of Pelo- 
ponnesus, called upon the Achaeans for assistance ; and 
the youthful Philip having been placed at the head of 
the Achaean League, a general war began between the 
Macedonians and Achaeans on the one side, and the 
^Etolians and their allies on the other, that continued 
with great severity and obstinacy for four years. Philip 
was on the whole successful, but new and more ambi- 
tious designs led him to put an end to the unprofitable 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 443 

contest. The great straggle going on between Rome 
and Carthage attracted his attention, and he thought 
that an alliance with the latter would open to himself 
prospects of future conquest and glory. So a treaty 
was concluded with the iEtolians, which left all the 
parties to the war in the enjoyment of their respective 
possessions (217 B.C.), and Philip prepared to enter the 
field against Rome. 

After the battle between Carthage and Rome at 
Can'nse (216 B.C.), which seemed to have extinguished 
the last hopes of Rome, Philip sent envoys to Hannibal, 
the Carthaginian general, and concluded with him a 
treaty of strict alliance. He next sailed with a fleet up 
the Adriatic, to assist Demetrius of Pharos, who had 
been driven from his Illyrian dominions by the Romans ; 
but while besieging Apollo'nia, a small town in Illyria, 
he was met and defeated by the Roman praetor M. 
Valerius Lgevi'nus, and was forced to burn his ships and 
retreat overland to Macedon. Such was the issue of his 
first encounter with the Romans. The latter now turned 
their attention to Greece (211 b.c), and contrived to 
keep Philip busy at home by inciting a violation of the 
recent treaty with the iEtolians, and by inducing Sparta 
and Elis to unite in a war against Macedon. Philip was 
for a time supported by the Achseans, under their re- 
nowned leader Philopce'men ; but Athens, which Philip 
had besieged, called in the aid of a Roman fleet (199 
b.c), and finally the Achseans themselves, being divided 
into factions, accepted terms of peace with the Romans. 
Philip continued to struggle against his increasing ene- 
mies until his defeat in the great battle of Cynoceph'alse 
(197 b.c), by the Roman consul Titus Flamin'ius, when 
he purchased peace by the sacrifice of his navy, the pay- 
ment of a tribute, and the resignation of his supremacy 
over the Grecian states. 



/ 



444 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

At this time there was a Grecian epigrammatic poet, 
Aloe'us, of Messe'ne, who was an ardent partisan of the 
Roman consul Flaminius, and who celebrated the defeat 
of Philip in some of his epigrams. He wrote the fol- 
lowing on the expedition of Flaminius : 

Xerxes from Persia led his mighty host, 

And Titus his from fair Italia's coast. 

Both warred with Greece ; but here the difference see : 

That brought a yoke — this gives us liberty. 

He also wrote the following sarcastic epigram on the 
Macedonians of Philip's army who were slain at Cyno- 
cephalse : 

Unmourned, unburied, passenger, we lie, 

Three myriad sons of fruitful Thessaly, 

In this wide field of monumental clay. 

JEtolian Mars had marked us for his prey ; 

Or he who, bursting from the Ausonian fold, 

In Titus' form the waves of battle rolled ; 

And taught iEma'thia's boastful lord to run 

So swift that swiftest stags were by his speed outdone. 

Philip is said to have retorted this insult by the fol- 
lowing inscription on a tree, in which he pretty plainly 
states the chastisement Alcseus would receive were he 
to fall into the hands of his enemy : 

Unbarked, and leafless, passenger, you see, 
Fixed in this mound Alcseus' gallows-tree. 

Trans, by J. H. Merivale. 



V. GREECE CONQUERED BY ROME. 

At the Isthmian games, held at Corinth the year after 
the downfall of Philip, the Roman consul Flaminius, a 
true friend of Greece, under the authority of the Ro- 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 445 

man Senate caused proclamation to be made, that Borne 
"took off all impositions and withdrew all garrisons 
from Greece, and restored liberty, and their own laws 
and privileges, to the several states" (196 B.C.). The de- 
luded Greeks received this announcement with exulta- 
tion, and the highest honors which a grateful people 
could bestow were showered upon Flaminius. 1 

A Roman master stands on Grecian ground, 

And to the concourse of the Isthmian games 

He, by his herald's voice, aloud proclaims 

" The liberty of Greece !" The words rebound 

Until all voices in one voice are drowned ; 

Glad acclamation by which the air was rent ! 

And birds, high flying in the element, 

Dropped to the earth, astonished at the sound ! 

A melancholy echo of that noise 

Doth sometimes hang on musing Fancy's ear. 

Ah! that a conqueror's words should be so dear; 

Ah ! that a boon should shed such rapturous joys ! 

A gift of that which is not to be given 

By all the blended powers of earth and heaven. 

William Wordsworth. 

The Greeks soon realized that the freedom which 
Kome affected to bestow was tendered by a power that 
could withdraw it at pleasure. First, the ^Etolians were 
reduced to poverty and deprived of their independence, 
for having espoused the cause of Anti'ochus of Syria, 
the enemy of Koine. At a later period Perseus, the 
successor of Philip on the throne of Macedon, being 
driven into a war by Koman ambition, finally lost his 
kingdom in the battle of Pydna (168 b.c.) ; and then the 
Achseans were charged with having aided Macedon in 

i See a more full aceount of the events connected with this proclama- 
tion, in dlosaics of Roman History . 



446 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

her war with Rome, and, without a shadow of proof 
against them, one thousand of their worthiest citizens 
were seized and sent to Kome for trial (167 B.C.). Here 
they were kept seventeen years without a hearing, when 
three hundred of their number, all who survived, were 
restored to their country. These and other acts of cru- 
elty aroused a spirit of vengeance against the Romans, 
that soon culminated in war. But the Achseans and 
their allies were defeated by the consul Mum'mius, near 
Corinth (146 B.C.), and that city, then the richest in 
Greece, was plundered of its treasures and consigned to 
the flames. Corinth was specially distinguished for its 
perfection in the arts of painting and sculpture, and the 
poet Antip'atek, of Sidon, thus describes the desolation 
of the city after its destruction by the Eomans : 

Where, Corinth, are thy glories now — 

Thy ancient wealth, thy castled brow, 

Thy solemn fanes, thy halls of state, 

Thy high-born dames, thy crowded gate ? 

There's not a ruin left to tell 

Where Corinth stood, how Corinth fell. 

The Nereids of thy double sea 

Alone remain to wail for thee. 

Trans, by Goldwin Smith. 

The last blow to the liberties of the Hellenic race had 
now been struck, and all Greece, as far as Epi'rus and 
Macedonia, became a Roman province under the name 
of Achaia. Says Thirlwall, " The end of the Achaean 
war was the last stage of the lingering process by which 
Rome enclosed her victim in the coils of her insidious 
diplomacy, covered it with the slime of her sycophants 
and hirelings, crushed it when it began to struggle, and 
then calmly preyed upon its vitals." But although Greece 
had lost her independence, and many of her cities were 



FROM ALEXANDER TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 447 

desolate, or had sunk into insignificance, she still re- 
tained her renown for philosophy and the arts, and be- 
came the instructor of her conquerors. In the well- 
known words of Horace, 

When conquered Greece brought in her captive arts, 
She triumphed o'er her savage conquerors' hearts. 

Bk. II. Epistle 1. 

As another has said, " She still retained a sovereignty 
which the Romans could not take from her, and to which 
they were obliged to pay homage." In whatever quar- 
ter Rome turned her victorious arms she encountered 
Greek colonies speaking the Greek language, and en- 
joying the arts of civilization. All these were absorbed 
by her, but they were not lost. They diffused Greek 
customs, thought, speech, and art over the Latin world, 
and Hellas survived in the intellectual life of a new 
empire. 



448 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



CHAPTEK XYII. 

LITERATURE AND ART AFTER THE CLOSE OF THE 

PELOPONNESIAN WAR. 

LITERATURE. 
I. THE DRAMA. 

As we have seen in a former chapter, Greek tragedy 
attained its zenith with the three great masters— ^Eschy- 
las, Sophocles, and Euripides. As Mahaffy well says, 
" Its later annals are but a history of decay ; and of the 
vast herd of latter tragedians two only, and two of the 
earliest— Ion of -Ghi'os, and Ag'athon — can be called 
living figures in a history of Greek literature." Even 
these, it seems, wrote before Sophocles and Euripides 
had closed their careers. But few fragments of their 
genius have come down to us. Longi'nus said of Ion, 
that he was fluent and polished, rather than bold or sub- 
lime ; while Agathon has been characterized as "the 
creator of a new tragic style, combining the verbal ele- 
gancies and ethical niceties of the Sophists with artistic 
claims of a luxurious kind." 

While tragedy declined, with comedy the case was 
different, for its changes were progressive. Most writers 
divide Greek comedy into the Old, the Middle, and the 
New; and although the boundary lines between the 
three orders are very indistinct, each has certain well- 
defined characteristics. It is asserted, as we have else- 
where noted, that the chief subjects of the first were the 
politics of the day and the characters and deeds of lead- 
ing persons ; that the chief peculiarity of the second, in 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 449 

which the action of the chorus was much curtailed, was 
the exclusion of personal and political criticism, and the 
adoption of parodies of the gods and ridicule of certain 
types of character ; and that the New Comedy, in which 
the chorus disappeared, aimed to paint scenes and char- 
acters of domestic life. The Middle Comedy, however, 
still continued to be in some degree personal and politi- 
cal, and even in the New Comedy these features of the 
Old are frequently apparent. 

Aristophanes, the leader of the Old Comedy, toward 
the close of his life produced The Frogs — a work that 
signalized the transition from the Old to the Middle 
Comedy. The latter school, however, took its rise in 
Sicily, and its most distinguished authors were Antipli'- 
anes, probably of Athens, born in 404, and Alexis of 
Thu'rii, born about 394. The New Comedy arose after 
Athens had fallen under Macedonian supremacy, and as 
many as sixty-four poets belong to this period, the later 
of whom composed their plays in Alexandria, in the time 
of Alexander's successors. The founder of this school 
was Phile'mon of Soli, in Cilicia, born about 360 b.c. 
Of his ninety plays fragments of fifty-six remain. The 
majority of these have been described as " elegant but 
not profound reflections on the 'changes and chances of 
this mortal life.' " A late critic chooses the following 
fragment as illustrative of Philemon, and at the same 
time favorable to his reputation : 

Have faith in God, and fear; seek not to know him ; 
For thou wilt gain naught else beyond thy search; 
Whether he is or is not, shun to ask : 
As one who is, and sees thee, always fear him. 

Trans, by J. A. Symonds. 
MEXANDER. 

The acknowledged master and representative of this 
period, however, and the last of the classical poets of 



450 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Greece, was Menan'der, an Athenian, son of Diopi'thes, 
the general whom Demosthenes defended in his speech 
" On the Chersonese," and a nephew of the poet Alexis. 
Menander was born in 342 b.o. ; and although only frag- 
ments of his writings exist, he was so closely copied or 
imitated by the Koman comic poets that his style and 
character can be very clearly traced. Mr. Symonds thus 
describes him : " His personal beauty, the love of refined 
pleasure that distinguished him in life, the serene and 
genial temper of his wisdom, the polish of his verse, and 
the harmony of parts he observed in composition, justify 
us in calling Menander the Sophocles of comedy. If 
we were to judge by the fragments transmitted to us, 
we should have to say that Menander's comedy was eth- 
ical philosophy in verse ; so mature is its wisdom, so 
weighty its language, so grave its tone. The brightness 
of the beautiful Greek spirit is sobered down in him al- 
most to sadness. Yet the fact that Stobse'us found him 
a fruitful source of sententious quotations, and that al- 
phabetical anthologies were made of his proverbial say- 
ings, ought not to obscure his fame for drollery and 
humor. If old men appreciated his genial or pungent 
worldly wisdom, boys and girls read him, we are told, 
for his love-stories." 

Menander was an intimate friend of Epicu'rus, the 
philosopher, and is supposed to have adopted his teach- 
ings. On this point, however, Ik. Symonds thus re- 
marks : " Speaking broadly, the philosophy in vogue at 
Athens during the period of the New Comedy was what 
in modern days is known as Epicureanism. Yet it would 
be unjust to confound the grave and genial wisdom of 
Menander with so trivial a philosophy as that which 
may be summed up in the sentence ' eat and drink, for 
to-morrow we die.' A fragment from an unknown play 
of his expresses the pathos of human existence with a 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 451 

depth of feeling that is inconsistent with mere pleasure- 
seekinsr : 






When thou would'st know thyself, what man thou art, 

Look at the tombstones as thou passest by : 

Within those monuments lie bones and dust 

Of monarchs, tyrants, sages, men whose pride 

Rose high because of wealth, or noble blood, 

Or haughty soul, or loveliness of limb ; 

Yet none of these things strove for them 'gainst time; 

One common death hath ta'en all mortal men. 

See thou to this, and know thee who thou art.' " 

As Eugene Lawrence says : " Most modern comedies 
are founded on those of Menander. They revive their 
characters, repeat their jokes, transplant their humor; 
and the wit of Moliere, Shakspeare, or Sheridan is often 
the same that once awoke shouts of laughter on the 
Attic stage." 



II. ORATORY. 

Thence to the famous orators repair, 

Those ancient, whose resistless eloquence 

Wielded at will that fierce democracy, 

Shook the arsenal, and fulmined over Greece 

To Macedon and Artaxerxes' throne. Milton. 

Eloquence, or oratory, which Cicero calls " the friend 
of peace and the companion of tranquillity, requiring 
for her cradle a commonwealth already well-established 
and flourishing," was fostered and developed in Greece 
by the democratic character of her institutions. It was 
scarcely known there until the time of Themistocles, the 
first orator of note; and in the time of Pericles it sud- 
denly rose, in Athens, to a great height of perfection. 
Pericles himself, whose great aim was to sway the as- 
semblies of the people to his will, cultivated oratory with 
such application and success, that the poets of his day 
said of him that on some occasions the goddess of per- 



452 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

suasion, with all her charms, seemed to dwell on his lips ; 
and that, at other times, his discourse had all the vehe- 
mence of thunder to move the souls of his hearers. The 
golden age of Grecian eloquence is embraced in a period 
of one hundred and thirty years from the time of Peri- 
cles, and during this period Athens bore the palm alone. 
Of the many Athenian orators the most distinguished 
were Lys'ias, Isoc'rates, ^Eschines, and Demosthenes. 
The first was born about 435 B.C., and was admired for 
the perspicuity, purity, sweetness, and delicacy of his 
style. Having become a resident of Thurii in early 
life, on his return to Athens he was not allowed to speak 
in the assemblies, or courts of justice, and therefore 
wrote orations for others to deliver. Many of these 
are characterized by great energy and power. Diony- 
sius, the Roman historian and critic, praises Lysias for 
his grace; Cicero commends him for his subtlety; and * 
Qnintilian esteems him for his truthfulness. Isocrates 
was born at Athens in 436. Having received the in- 
structions of some of the most celebrated Sophists of 
his time, he opened a school of rhetoric, and was equally 
esteemed for the excellence of his compositions— mostly 
political orations— and for his success in teaching. His 
style was more philosophic, smooth, and elegant than 
that of Lysias. " Cicero," says a modern critic, " whose 
style is exceedingly like that of Isocrates, appears to 
have especially used him as a model— as indeed did 
Demosthenes; and through these two orators he has 
moulded all the prose of modern Europe." Isocrates 
lived to the advanced age of ninety-eight, and then died, 
it is said, by voluntary starvation, in grief for the fatal 
battle of Chseronea. 

"That dishonest victory 
At Chaeronea, fatal to liberty, 
Killed with report that old man eloquent," 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 453 
J3S CHINES AND DEMOSTHENES. 

The orator iEschines was born in 398 b.c. He is re- 
garded as the father of extemporaneous speaking among 
the Greeks, but is chiefly distinguished as the rival of 
Demosthenes, rather than for his few orations (but three 
in number) that have come down to us, although he was 
endowed by nature with extraordinary rhetorical powers, 
and his orations are characterized by ease, order, clear- 
ness, and precision. "The eloquence of JEschines," says 
an American scholar and statesman, 1 "is of a brilliant 
and showy character, running occasionally, though very 
rarely, into a Ciceronean declamation. In general his 
taste is unexceptionable; he is clear in statement, close 
and cogent in argument, lucid in arrangement, remarka- 
bly graphic and animated in style, and full of spirit and 
pleasantry, without the least appearance of emphasis or 
effort. He is particularly successful in description and 
the portraiture of character. That his powers were ap- 
preciated by his great rival is evident from the latter's 
frequent admonitions to the assembly to remember that 
their debates are no theatrical exhibitions of voice and 
oratory, but deliberations involving the safety of their 
country." 

On leaving Athens, after his defeat in the celebrated 
contest with Demosthenes, ^Eschines went to Rhodes, 
where he established a school of rhetoric. It is stated 
that on one occasion he began his instruction by read- 
ing the two orations that had been the cause of his ban- 
ishment. His hearers loudly applauded his own speech, 
but when he read that of Demosthenes they were wild 
with delight. "If you thus praise it from my reading 



1 Hugh S. Legare, of Charleston, South Carolina, in an article on "De- 
mosthenes" in the New York Review. 



454 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

it," exclaimed JEschines, " what would you have said if 
you had heard Demosthenes himself deliver it ?" 

By the common consent of ancient and modern times, 
Demosthenes stands pre-eminent for his eloquence, his 
patriotism, and his influence over the Athenian people. 
He was born about 383 b.c. On attaining his majority, 
his first speech was directed against a cousin to whom 
his inheritance had been intrusted, and who refused to 
surrender to him what was left of it. Demosthenes won 
his case, and his victory brought him into such promi- 
nent notice that he was soon engaged to write pleadings 
for litigants in the courts. He devoted himself to inces- 
sant study and practice in oratory, and, overcoming by 
various means a weakly body and an impediment in his 
speech, he became the chief of orators. Of his public 
life we have already seen something in the history of 
Athens. With all his moral and intellectual force, the 
closing years of his life were shaded with misery and 
disgrace. Fifty years after his death the Athenians 
erected a bronze statue to his memory, and upon the 
pedestal placed this inscription : 

Divine in speech, in judgment, too, divine , 
Had valor's wreath, Demosthenes, been thine, 
Fair Greece had still her freedom's ensign borne, 
And held the scourge of Macedon in scorn ! 

With regard to the character of the orations of De- 
mosthenes,^it must be confessed that somewhat conflict- 
ing views have been entertained by the moderns. Lord 
Brougham, while admitting that Demosthenes " never 
wanders from the subject, that each remark tells upon 
the matter in hand, that all his illustrations are brought 
to bear upon the point, and that he is never found mak- 
ing a step in any direction which does not advance his 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 455 

main object, and lead toward the conclusion to which he 
is striving to bring his hearers," still denies that he is 
distinguished for those " chains of reasoning," and that 
"fine argumentation" which are the chief merit of our 
greatest modern orators. While he admits that Demos- 
thenes abounds in the most "appropriate topics, and 
such happy hits — to use a homely but expressive phrase 
— as have a magical effect upon a popular assembly, and 
that he clothes them in the choicest language, arranges 
them in the most perfect order, and captivates the ear 
with a music that is fitted, at his will, to provoke or 
to soothe, and even to charm the sense," he regards all 
this as better suited to great popular assemblies than to 
a more refined, and a more select audience — such as one 
composed of learned senators and judges. But this is 
admitting that he adapted himself, with admirable tact 
and judgment, to the subject and the occasion. But 
while the character thus attributed to the orations of the 
great Athenian orator may be the true one, as regards 
the Philippics, the speech against JEschines, and the 
one on the Crown, it is not thought to be applicable 
to the many pleas which he made on occasions more 
strictly judicial. 

" That which distinguishes the eloquence of Demos- 
thenes above all others, ancient or modern," says the 
American writer already quoted, "is earnestness, convic- 
tion, and the power to persuade that belongs to a strong 
and deep persuasion felt by the speaker. It is what Mil- 
ton defines true eloquence to be, 'none but the serious 
and hearty love of truth' — or, more properly, w r hat the 
speaker believes to be truth. This advantage Demos- 
thenes had over ^Eschines. He had faith in his country, 
faith in her people (if they could be roused up), faith in 
her institutions. He is mad at the bare thought that a 
man of Macedon, a barbarian, should be beating Athe- 



456 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

nians in the field, and giving laws to Greece. The Eo- 
man historian and critic, Dionysins, said of his oratory, 
that its highest attribute was the spirit of life that per- 
vades it. Other remarkable features were its amazing 
flexibility and variety, its condensation and perfect logi- 
cal unity, its elaborate and exquisite finish of details, to 
which must be added that polished harmony and rhythm 
which cannot be attained, to a like degree, in any mod- 
ern language. Moreover, however elaborately composed 
these speeches were, they were still speeches, and had 
the appearance of being the spontaneous effusions of the 
moment. No extemporaneous harangues were ever more 
free and natural." 

The historian Hume says of the style of Demosthenes : 
" It was rapid harmony adjusted to the sense ; vehement 
reasoning without any appearance of art ; disdain, anger, 
boldness, and freedom, involved in a continued strain of 
argument." Another writer says : " It was his undevi- 
ating firmness, his disdain of all compromise, that made 
him the first of statesmen and orators ; in this lay the 
substance of his power, the primary foundation of his 
superiority ; the rest was merely secondary. The mys- 
tery of his mighty influence, then, lay in his honesty; 
and it is this that gave warmth and tone to his feelings, 
an energy to his language, and an impression to his man- 
ner before which every imputation of insincerity must 
have immediately vanished." 



III. PHILOSOPHY. 
PLATO. 

While oratory was thus attaining perfection in Greece, 
philosophy was making equal progress in the direction 
marked out by Socrates. Among the philosophers of 
the brighter period of Grecian history are the names of 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 457 

Plato and Aristotle, names that will ever be cherished 
and venerated while genius and worth continue to be 
held in admiration. Of the pupils of Socrates, Plato, 
born in Athens in 429 b.c, was by far the most distin- 
guished, and the only one who fully appreciated the in- 
tellectual greatness and seized the profound conceptions 
of his master. In fact, he came to surpass Socrates in 
the profoundness of his views, and in the correctness 
and eloquence with which he expressed them. On the 
death of his teacher, Plato left Athens and passed twelve 
years in visiting different countries, engaged in philo- 
sophic investigation. Returning to Athens, he founded 
his school of philosophy in the Acade'mia, a beautiful 
spot in the suburbs of the city, adorned with groves, 
walks, and fountains, and which his name has immor- 
talized. 

Here Philosophy 

With Plato dwelt, and burst the chains of mind ; 

Here, with his stole across his shoulders flung, 

His homely garments with a leathern zone 

Confined, his snowy beard low clust'ring down 

Upon his ample chest, his keen dark eye 

Glancing from underneath the arched brow, 

He fixed his sandaled foot, and on his staff 

Leaned, while to his disciples he declared 

How all creation's mighty fabric rose 

From the abyss of chaos : next he traced 

The bounds of virtue and of vice ; the source 

Of good and evil ; sketched the ideal form 

Of beauty, and unfolded all the powers 

Of mind by which it ranges uncontrolled, 

And soars from earth to immortality. Hatgarth. 

To Plato, as the poet intimates in his closing lines, we 
owe the first formal development of the Socratic doc- 
trine of the spirituality of the soul, and the first attempt 

20 



458 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

toward demonstrating its immortality. As a late writer 
' has well said, " It is the genius of Socrates that fills all 
Plato's philosophy, and their two minds have flowed out 
over the world together." Of his doctrine on this sub- 
ject, as expressed in the Phce'do, Lord Brougham thus 
wrote: "The whole tenor of it refers to a renewal or 
continuation of the soul as a separate and individual 
existence after the dissolution of the body, and with a 
complete consciousness of personal identity : in short, to 
a continuance of the same rational being's existence after 
death. The liberation from the body is treated as the 
beginning of a new and more perfect life." Plato's only 
work on physical science is the Timm'us. His works are 
all called "Dialogues," which the critics divide into two 
classes— those of search, and those of exposition. Among 
the latter, the Republic and the Laws give us the au- 
thor's political views ; and, on the former, More's TJto'- 
pia and other works of like character in modern times 
are founded. 

" Plato, of all authors," says Dr. A. C. Kendrick, 1 " is 
the one to whom the least justice can be done by any 
formal analysis. In the spirit which pervades his writ- 
ings, in their untiring freshness, in their purity, love of 
truth and of virtue, their perpetual aspiring to the lofti- 
est height of knowledge and of excellence, much more 
than in their positive doctrines, lies the secret of their 
charm and of their unfailing power. Plato is often 
styled an idealist. But this is true of the spirit rather 
than of the form of his doctrine ; for strictly he is an in- 
tense realist, and differs from his great pupil, Aristotle, 
far less in his mere philosophical method than in his 
lofty moral and religious aspirations, which were perpet- 
ually winging his spirit toward the beautiful and the 



Article "Plato," in Appleton's American Cyclopedia. 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 459 

good. His formal errors are abundant; but even in his 
errors the truth is often deeper than the error ; and when 
that has been discredited, the language adjusts itself to 
the deeper truth of which it was rather an inadequate 
expression than a direct contradiction." Concerning the 
style of Plato's writings, a distinguished English scholar 
and translator observes as follows : " Nor is the language 
in which his thoughts are conveyed less remarkable than 
the thoughts themselves. In his more elevated passages 
he rises, like his own Prometheus, to heaven, and brings 
down from thence the noblest of all thefts, 1 Wisdom 
with Fire; but, in general, calm, pure, and unaffected, 
his style flows like a stream which gurgles its own mu- 
sic as it runs ; and his works rise, like the great fabric of 
Grecian literature, of which they are the best model, in 
calm and noiseless majesty." 8 

Plato died at the advanced age of eighty-one, his men- 
tal powers unimpaired, and he was buried in the Acad- 
eme. On his tomb was placed the following inscription : 

Here, first of all men for pure justice famed, 
Aris'tocles, 3 the moral teacher, lies : 
And if there ere has lived one truly wise, 

This man was wiser still : too great for envy. 

ARISTOTLE. 

Aristotle was born in 384 B.C., at Stagi'ra, in Macedo- 
nia. Hence he is frequently called the " Stag'i-rite," as 
Pope calls him in the following tribute found in his 
Temple of Fame : 

Here, in a shrine that cast a dazzling light, 
Sat, fixed in thought, the mighty Stagirite ; 

1 See the story of Prometheus, page 37. 2 Thomas Mitchell. 

3 The proper name of Plato was Aristocles : but ia his youth he was 
surnamed Plato by his companions in the gymnasium, on account of his 
broad shoulders. (From the Greek word platus, " broad.") 



460 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

His sacred head a radiant zodiac crowned, 
And various animals his sides surround; 
His piercing eyes, erect, appear to view 
Superior worlds, and look all nature through. 

He repaired to Athens at the age of seventeen, and soon 
after became a pupil of Plato. His uncommon acute- 
ness of apprehension, and his indefatigable industry, 
early won the notice and applause of his master, who 
called him the " mind" of the school, and said, when he 
was absent, " Intellect is not here." On the death of 
Plato, Aristotle left Athens, and in 343 he repaired to 
Macedonia, on the invitation of Philip, and became the 
instructor of the young prince Alexander. In after 
years Alexander aided him in his scientific pursuits by 
sending to him many objects of natural history, and giv- 
ing him large sums of money, estimated in all at two 
millions of dollars. 

In the year 335 Aristotle returned to Athens, and 
opened his school in the Lyceum. He walked with his 
scholars up and down the shady avenues, conversing on 
philosophy, and hence his school was called t\\e peripa- 
tetic. Aristotle nowhere exhibits the merits of Plato in 
the service of metaphysics, yet he was the most learned 
and most productive of the writers of Greece. He had 
neither the poetical imagination nor the genius of his 
teacher, but he mastered the whole philosophical and his- 
torical science of his age, and, more than Plato, his in- 
tellect has influenced the course of modern civilization. 
He was eminently a practical philosopher— a cold in- 
quirer, whose mind did not reach the high and lofty 
teaching of Plato, concerning Deity and the destiny of 
mankind. We find the following just estimate of him 
in Browne's Greek Classical Literature: "One cannot 
set too high a value on the practical nature of Aristotle's 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 461 

mind. He never forgot the bearing of all philosophy 
upon the happiness of man, and he never lost sight of 
man's wants and requirements. He saw the inadequacy 
of all knowledge, unless he could trace in it a visible 
practical tendency. But, beyond this one single point, 
he falls grievously short of his great master, Plato. All 
his ideas of man's good are limited to the consideration 
of this life alone. It is impossible to trace in his writ- 
ings any belief in a future state or immortality." 

For many centuries succeeding the Middle Ages, es- 
pecially from the eleventh to the fifteenth, the meta- 
physical teachings of Aristotle held a tyrannic sway over 
the public mind ; but they have been gradually yielding 
to the more lofty and sublime teachings of Plato. His 
investigations in natural science, however, and his work 
as a logician and political philosopher, constitute his 
greatness, and create the enormous influence that he lias 
wielded in the world. "Science owes to him its ear- 
liest impulse," says Mr. Lawrence. "He perfected and 
brought into form," says Dr. William Smith, " those el- 
ements of the dialectic art which had been struck out 
by Socrates and Plato, and wrought them by his addi- 
tions into so complete a system that he may be regarded 
as at once the founder and perfecter of logic as an art." 
Says Mahafft, " He has built his politics upon so sound 
a philosophic basis, and upon the evidence of so large 
and varied a political experience, that his lessons on the 
rise and fall of governments will never grow old, and 
will be perpetually receiving fresh corroborations, so 
long as human nature remains the same." Aristotle was 
a friend of the Macedonians, and, on the death of Alex- 
ander, he fled from Athens to -Chal'cis, in Eubcea, to 
escape a trial for impiety. There he died in 322 b.c. 

In the lives of the three great philosophers of Greece 
— Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle — is embraced what is 



462 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

commonly called " The Philosophical Era of Athens." 
To this era Milton has beautifully alluded in his well- 
known description of the famous city; and for the 
Academe, or Academia, the beautiful garden that was 
the resort of the philosophers, Edwin Arnold expresses 
these sentiments of veneration : 

Pleasanter than the hills of Thessaly, 

Nearer and dearer to the poet's heart 

Than the blue ripple belting Salamis, 

Or long grass waving over Marathon, 

Fair Academe, most holy Academe, 

Thou art, and hast been, and shalt ever be. 

I would be numbered now with things that were, 

Changing the wasting fever of to-day 

For the dear quietness of yesterday : 

I would be ashes, underneath the grass, 

So I had wandered in thy platane walks 

One happy summer twilight — even one. 

Was it not grand, and beautiful, and rare, 

The music and the wisdom and the shade, 

The music of the pebble-paven rills, 

And olive boughs, and bowered nightingales, 

Chorusing joyously the joyous things 

Told by the gray Silenus of the grove, 

Low-fronted and large-hearted Socrates ! 

Oh, to have seen under the olive blossoms 

But once — only once in a mortal life, 

The marble majesties of ancient gods ! 

And to have watched the ring of listeners — 

The Grecian boys gone mad for love of truth, 

The Grecian girls gone pale for love of him 

Who taught the truth, who battled for the truth ; 

And girls and boys, women and bearded men, 

Crowding to hear and treasure in their hearts 

Matter to make their lives a happiness, 

And death a happy ending. 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 463 



EPICU'RUS AND ZE'SO. 

What is known as the Epicurean school of philosophy 
was founded by Epicurus., a native of Samos, born in 
342, who went to Athens in early youth, and, at the age 
of thirty, established himself as a philosophical teacher. 
He met with great success. He did not believe in the 
soul's immortality, and taught the pursuit of mental 
pleasure and happiness as the highest good. While his 
learning was not great, he was a man of urtsullied moral- 
ity, respected and loved by his followers to a wonderful 
degree. Although he wrote books in advocacy of piety, 
and the reverence due to the gods on account of the 
excellence of their nature, he maintained that they had 
no concern in human affairs. Hence the Koman poet 
Lucretius, who lived when the old belief in the gods 
and goddesses of the heathen world had nearly faded 
away, attributes to the teachings of Epicurus the tri- 
umph of philosophy over superstition. 

On earth in bondage base existence lay, 

Bent down by Superstition's iron sway. 

She from the heavens disclosed her monstrous head, 

And dark with grisly aspect, scowling dread, 

Hung o'er the sons of men ; but toward the skies 

A man of Greece dared lift his mortal eyes, 

And first resisting stood. Not him the fame 

Of deities, the lightning's forky flame, 

Or muttering murmurs of the threat'ning sky 

Repressed ; but roused his soul's great energy 

To break the bars that interposing lay, 

And through the gates of nature burst his way. 

That vivid force of soul a passage found ; 
The flamino- walls that close the world around 
He far o'erleaped ; his spirit soared on high 
Through the vast whole, the one infinity. 



464 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Victor, he brought the tidings from the skies 

What things in nature may, or may not, rise ; 

What stated laws a power finite assign, 

And still with bounds impassable confine. 

Thus trod beneath our feet the phantom lies ; 

We mount o'er Superstition to the skies. 

Trans, by Elton. 

The school of the Stoics was founded by Zeno, a 
native of Cyprus, who went to Athens about 299 b.c, 
and opened a school in the Poi'Jci-le Sto'a, or painted 
porch, whence the name of his sect arose. As is well 
known, the chief tenets of the Stoics were temperance 
and self-denial, which Zeno himself practised by living 
on uncooked food, wearing very thin garments in winter, 
and refusing the comforts of life generally. To the 
Stoics pleasure was irrational, and pain a visitation to 
be borne with ease. Both Stoicism and Epicureanism 
flourished among the Eomans. The teachings of Epic- 
tetus, the Eoman Stoic philosopher, are summed up in 
the formula, " Bear and forbear ;" and he is said to have 
observed that "Man is but a pilot; observe the star, 
hold the rudder, and be not distracted on thy way." 
Both these schools of philosophy, however, passed into 
scepticism. Epicureanism became a material fatalism 
and a search for pleasure; while Stoicism ended in 
spiritual fatalism. But when the Gospel awakened the 
human heart to life, it was the Greek mind which gave 
mankind a Christian theology. 



IV. HISTORY. 
XENOPHON. 

The most distinguished Greek historian of this period 
was Xenophon, of whom we have already seen some- 
thino- as the leader of the famous "Ketreat of the Ten 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 465 

Thousand," and as the author of a delightful and instruc- 
tive account of that achievement. He was born in 
Athens about 443 b.c., and at an early age became the 
pupil of Socrates, to whose principles he strictly ad- 
hered through life, in practice as well as in theory. 
Seemingly on account of his philosophical views he was 
banished by the Athenians, before his return from the 
expedition into Asia; but the Spartans, with whom he 
fought against Athens at Coronea, gave him an estate 
at Scil'lus, in Elis, and here he lived, engaging in liter- 
ary pursuits, that were diversified by domestic enjoy- 
ments and active field-sports. He died either at Scillus 
or at Corinth — to which latter place some authorities 
think he removed in the later years of his life — in the 
ninetieth year of his age. 

Among the works of Xenophon is the Anab'asis, con- 
sidered his best, descriptive of the advance into Persia 
and the masterly Retreat; the Hellen'ica, a history of 
Greece, in seven books, from the time of Thucydides to 
the battle of Mantine'a, in 362 b.c. ; the Cyropcedi' a, a 
political romance, based on the history of Cyrus the 
Great ; a treatise on the horse, and the duties of a cav- 
alry commander ; a treatise on hunting ; a picture of 
an Athenian banquet, and of the amusement and con- 
versation with which it was diversified ; and, the most 
pleasing of all, the Memorabilia, devoted to the defence 
of the life and principles of Socrates. Concerning the 
remarkable miscellany of Xenophon, Mb. Mitchell 
says : " The writer who has thrown equal interest into 
an account of a retreating army and the description of 
a scene of coursing ; who has described with the same 
fidelity a common groom and a perfect pattern of con- 
jugal faithfulness — such a man had seen life under as- 
pects which taught him to know that there were things 
of infinitely more importance than the turn of a phrase, 

20* 



466 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the music of a cadence, and the other niceties which are 
wanted by a luxurious and opulent metropolis. The 
virtuous feelings that were necessary in a mind consti- 
tuted as his was, took into their comprehensive bosom 
the welfare of the world." 

Although the genius of Xenophon was not of the 
highest order, his writings have afforded, to all succeed- 
ing ages, one of the best models of purity, simplicity, 
and harmony of language. By some of his contempo- 
raries he has been styled " The Attic Muse ;" by others, 
" The Athenian Bee ;" while his manners and personal 
appearance have been described by Diog'enes Laer'tius, 
in his Lives of the Philosophers, in the following brief 
but comprehensive sentence: "Modest in deportment, 
and beautiful in person to a remarkable degree." 

POLYB'lUS, 

Of the prominent Greek historians, Polybius was the 
last. Born about 204 b.c., he lived and wrote in the 
closing period of Grecian history. Having been carried 
a prisoner to Eome with the one thousand prominent 
citizens of Achaia, his accomplishments secured for him 
the friendship of Scip'io Africa'nus Mi'nor, and of his 
father, iEmil'ius Pau'lus, at whose house he resided. 
He spent his time in collecting materials for his works, 
and in giving instruction to Scipio. In the year 150 
b.c. he returned to his native country with the surviv- 
ing exiles, and actively exerted himself to induce the 
Greeks to keep peace with the Eomans, but, as we know, 
without success. After the Roman conquest the Greeks 
seem to have awakened to the wisdom of his advice, for 
on a statue erected to his memory was the inscription, 
"Hellas would have been saved had the advice of Po- 
lybius been followed." Polybius wrote a history in 
forty books, embracing the time between the commence- 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 467 

ment of the Second Punic War, in 21S B.C., and the 
destruction of Carthage and Corinth by the Kotnans, in 
146 b.c. It is the most trustworthy history we possess 
of this period, and has been closely copied by subsequent 
writers. A correct estimate of its character and worth 
will be found in the following summary : 

" The greater part of the valuable and laborious work 
of Polybius has perished. We have only the first five 
books entire, and fragments and extracts of the rest. 
As it is, however, it is one of the most valuable histori- 
cal works that has come down to us. His style, indeed, 
will not bear a comparison witli the great masters of 
Greek literature: he is not eloquent, like Thucydides; 
nor practical, like Herodotus ; nor perspicuous and ele- 
gant, like Xenophon. He lived at a time when the 
Greek language had lost much of its purity by an inter- 
mixture of foreign elements, and he did not attempt to 
imitate the language of the Attic writers. He wrote 
as he spoke : he gives us the first rough draft of his 
thoughts, and seldom imposes on himself the trouble 
to arrange or methodize them ; hence, they are often 
meagre and desultory, and not unfrequently deviate 
entirely from the subject. 

" But in the highest quality of an historian — the love 
of truth— Polybius has no superior. This always pre- 
dominates in his writings. He has judgment to trace 
effects to their causes, a full knowledge of his subjects, 
and an impartiality that forbids him to conceal it to 
favor any party or cause. In his geographical descrip- 
tions he is not always clear, but his descriptions of bat- 
tles have never been surpassed. 'His writings have been 
admired by the warrior, copied by the politician, and 
imitated by the historian. Brutus had him ever in his 
hands, Tully transcribed him, and many of the finest pas- 
sages of Livy are the property of the Greek historian.' " 



468 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ART. 
I. ARCHITECTURE AND SCULPTURE. 

After the close of the Peloponnesian war the perfec- 
tion and application of the several orders of Grecian ar- 
chitecture were displayed in the laying out of cities on 
a grander scale, and by an increase of splendor in pri- 
vate residences, rather than by any marked change in 
the style of public buildings and temples. Alexandria 
in Egypt, and Antioch in Syria, were the finest exam- 
ples of Grecian genius in this direction, both in the reg- 
ularity and size of their public and private buildings, 
and in their external and internal adornment. This 
period was also distinguished for its splendid sepulchral 
and other monuments. Of these, probably the most ex- 
quisite gem of architectural taste is the circular building 
at Athens, the Cho-rag'ic Monument, or "Lantern of 
Demosthenes," erected in honor of a victory gained by 
the chorus of Lysic'rates in 334 b.c. " It is the purest 
specimen of the Corinthian order," says a writer on ar- 
chitecture, "that has reached our time, whose minute- 
ness and unobtrusive beauty have preserved it almost 
entire among the ruins of the mightiest piles of Athe- 
nian art." Other celebrated monuments of this period 
were the one erected at Halicarnas'sus by the Ca'rian 
queen Artemisia to the memory of her husband Mauso'- 
lus, adorned with sculptural decorations by Sco'pas and 
others, and considered one of the seven wonders of the 
world; and the octagonal edifice, the Horolo'gium of 
Androni'cus Cyrrhes'tes, at Athens. 

In sculpture, Athens still asserted its pre-eminence, 
but the style and character of its later school were 
materially different from those of the preceding one 
of Phid'ias. " Toward the close of the Peloponnesian 
war," says a recent writer, " a change took place in the 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 46& 

habits and feelings of the Athenian people, under the 
influence of which a new school of statuary was devel- 
oped. The people, spoiled by luxury, and craving the 
pleasures and excitements which the prosperity of the 
age of Pericles had opened to them, regarded the severe 
forms of the older masters 'with even less patience than 
the austere virtues of the generation which had driven 
the Persians out of Greece. The sculptors, giving a re- 
flex of the times in their productions, instead of the 
grand and sublime cultivated the soft, the graceful, and 
the flowing, and aimed at an expression of stronger pas- 
sion and more dramatic action. Jupiter, Juno, and Mi- 
nerva, the favorite subjects of the Phidian era, gave 
place to such deities as Yenus, Bacchus, and Amor ; and 
with the departure of the older gods departed also the 
serene and composed majesty which had marked the 
representations of them." ' 

The first great artist of this school was Scopas, born 
at Paros, and who flourished in the first half of the 
fourth century b.c. Although famous in architectural 
sculpture, he excelled in single figures and groups, "com- 
bining strength of expression with grace." The cele- 
brated group of Ni'o-be and her children slain by Ar'- 
temis and Apollo, a copy of which is preserved in the 
museum of Florence, and the statue of the victorious 
Yenus in the Louvre at Paris, are attributed to Scopas. 
The most esteemed of his works, according to Pliny, was 
a group representing Achilles conducted to the Island 
of Leu'ce by sea deities. The only other artist of this 
school that we will refer to is Praxiteles, a contempo- 
rary of Scopas. He excelled in representing the female 
figure, his masterpiece being the Cnid'ian Aphrodite, a 
naked statue : in Parian marble, modelled from life^ rep- 

« C. S. Weyman. 



470 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

resenting Yenus just leaving the bath. This statue was 
afterward taken to Constantinople, where it was burned 
during the reign of Justinian. 

This Athenian school of sculpture was followed, in 
the time of Alexander the Great, by what was called the 
Si-cy-o'ni-an school, of which Euphra'nor, of Corinth, and 
Lysip'pus, of Si'cy-on, were the leading representatives. 
The former was a painter as well as sculptor. His stat- 
ues were executed in bronze and marble, and were ad- 
mired for their dignity. Lysippus worked only in 
bronze, and was the only sculptor that Alexander the 
Great permitted to represent him in statues. His works 
were very numerous, including the colossal statue of 
Jupiter at Tarentum, sixty feet high, several of Hercu- 
les, and many others. The succeeding and later Greek 
sculptors made no attempt to open a new path of de- 
sign, but they steadily maintained the reputation of the 
art. : Many works of great excellence were produced in 
Ehodes, Alexandria, Ephesus, and elsewhere in the East. 
Among these was the famous Colossus, a statue of the 
sun, designed and executed by Chores of Ehodes, that 
reared its huge form one hundred and five feet in height 
at the entrance to Ehodes harbor ; the Farnese Bull, at 
Naples, found in the Baths of Caracalla at Eome, also 
the work of a Ehodian artist ; and the Apollo Belvedere, 

in the Vatican. 1 

Two works of this late age deserve special mention. 
One is the statue of the Dying Gladiator, in the Capito- 
line Museum at Eome, supposed to have come from Per- 
gamus. Says Lubke, "It undoubtedly represents a 
Gaul who, in battle, seeing the foe approach in over- 
whelming force, has fallen upon his own sword to escape 
a shameful slavery. Overcome by the faintness of ap- 



See page 149. 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 471 

proaching death, he has fallen upon his shield ; his right 
arm with difficulty prevents his sinking to the ground ; 
his life ebbs rapidly away with the blood streaming from 
the deep wound beneath his breast; his broad head 
droops heavily forward ; the mists of death already cloud 
his eyes ; his brows are knit with pain ; and his lips are 
parted in a last sigh. There is, perhaps, no other statue 
in which the bitter necessity of death is expressed with 
such terrible truth — all the more terrible because the 
hardy body is so full of strength." 

Supported on his shortened arm he leans, 

Prone agonizing ; with incumbent fate 

Heavy declines his head, yet dark beneath 

The suffering feature sullen vengeance lowers, 

Shame, indignation, unaccomplished rage ; 

And still the cheated eye expects his fall. 

Thomson. 

The other statue is that masterpiece of art, the group 
of the La-oc'o-on, now in the Yatican at Rome, the work 
of the three Rhodian sculptors, Agesan'dros, Polydo'rus, 
and Athenodo'rus. It represents a scene, in connection 
with the fall of Troy, that Virgil describes in the Second 
Book of the JEneid. A Trojan priest, named Laocoon, 
endeavored to propitiate Neptune by sacrifice, and to 
dissuade the Trojans from- admitting within the walls 
the fatal wooden horse, 1 whereupon the goddess Minerva, 
ever favorable to the Greeks, punished him by sending 
two enormous serpents from the sea to destroy him and 
his two sons. The poet Thomson well describes the 
agony and despair that the statue portrays : 

Such passion here ! 
Such agonies ! such bitterness of pain 
Seem so to tremble through the tortured stone 

1 See page 105. 



472 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

That tlie touched heart engrosses all the view. 
Almost unmarked the best proportions pass 
That ever Greece beheld ; and, seen alone, 
On the rapt eye the imperious passions seize : 
The father's double pangs, both for himself 
And sons, convulsed ; to Heaven his rueful look, 
Imploring aid, and half -accusing, cast ; 
His fell despair with indignation mixed 
As the strong-curling monsters from his side 
His full-extended fury cannot tear. 
More tender touched, with varied art, his sons 
All the soft rage of younger passions show : 
In a boy's helpless fate one sinks oppressed, 
While, yet unpierced, the frighted other tries 
His foot to steal out of the horrid twine. 

An American writer thus apostrophizes this grand 
representation : 

Laocoon ! thou great embodiment 

Of human life and human history ! 

Thou record of the past, thou prophecy 

Of the sad future ! thou majestic voice, 

Pealing along the ages from old time ! 

Thou wail of agonized humanity ! 

There lives no thought in marble like to thee ! 

Thou hast no kindred in the Vatican, 

But standest separate among the dreams 

Of old mythologies — alone— alone ! J. G. Holland. 



II. PAINTING. 

In painting, the Asiatic school of Zeuxis and Parrha- 
sius was also followed by a " Si-cy-o'ni-an school"— the 
third and last phase of Greek painting, founded by Eu- 
pom'pus, of Si'cy-on. The characteristics of this school 
were great ease, accuracy, and refinement. Among its 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 473 

chief masters were Pam'philus, Apel'les, Protog'enes, 
Ni'cias, and Aristides. Of these the most famous was 
Apelles, a native of Col'opkon, in Ionia, who flourished 
in the time of Alexander the Great, with whom he was 
a great favorite. Of his many fine productions the 
finest was his painting of Yenus rising from the Sea, 
and concerning which Antipater, the poet of Sidon, 
wrote the following epigram : 

Graceful as from her native sea she springs, 

Venus, the labor of Apelles, view : 
With pressing hands her humid locks she wrings, 

While from her tresses drips the frothy dew : 
Ev'n Juno and Minerva now declare, 
No longer we contend whose form's most fair. 

APELLES AXD PROTOGENES. 

A very pleasing story is told, by Pliny, of Apelles and 
his brother-artist, Protogenes, which Dr. Anthon relates 
as follows : 

"Apelles, having come to Rhodes, where Protogenes 
was then residing, paid a visit to the artist, but, not 
finding him at home, obtained permission from a do- 
mestic in waiting to enter his studio. Finding here a 
piece of canvas ready on the frame for the artist's pen- 
cil, Apelles drew T upon it a line (according to some, a 
figure in outline) with wonderful precision, and then 
retired without disclosing his name. Protogenes, on 
returning home, and discovering what had been done, 
exclaimed that Apelles alone could have executed such 
a sketch. However, he drew another himself — a line 
more nearly perfect than that of Apelles — and left direc- 
tions with his domestic that, when the stranger should 
call again, he should be shown what had been done by 
him. Apelles came, accordingly, and, perceiving that 
his line had been excelled by Protogenes, drew a third 



474 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

one, much better than the other two, and cutting both. 
Protogenes now confessed himself vanquished ; he ran 
to the harbor, sought for Apelles, and the two artists 
became the warmest friends. The canvas containing 
this famous trial of skill became highly prized, and at 
a later day was placed in the palace of the Caesars at 
Eome. Here it was burned in a conflagration that de- 
stroyed the palace itself." 

Protogenes was noted for his minute and scrupulous 
care in the preparation of his works. He carried this 
peculiarity to such excess that Apelles was moved to 
make the following comparison: "Protogenes equals or 
surpasses me in all things but one— the knowing when 
to remove his hand from a painting." Protogenes sur- 
vived Apelles, and became a very eminent painter. It 
is stated that when Demetrius besieged Ehodes, and 
could have reduced it by setting fire to a quarter of the 
city that contained one of the finest productions of Pro- 
togenes, he refused to do so lest he should destroy the 
masterpiece of art. It is to this incident that the poet 
Thomson undoubtedly refers when he says, 

E'en such enchantment then thy pencil poured, 
That cruei-thoughted War the impatient torch 
Dashed to the ground ; and, rather than destroy 
The patriot picture, let the city 'scape. 

From the time of Alexander the art of painting rap- 
idly deteriorated, and at the period of the Eoman con- 
quest it had scarcely an existence. Grecian art like 
Grecian liberty, had lost its spirit and vitality, and the 
spoliation of public buildings and galleries, to adorn the 
porticos and temples of Eome, hastened its extinction. 

We have now reached the close of the history of an- 
cient Greece. But Hellas still lives in her thousand 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 475 

hallowed associations of historic interest, and in the nu- 
merous ruins of ancient art and splendor which cover 
her soil — recalling a glorious Past, upon which we love 
to dwell as upon the memory of departed friends or the 
scenes of a happy childhood — " sweet, but mournful to 
the soul." And although the ashes of her generals, her 
poets, her scholars, and her artists are scattered from 
their urns, and her statuary and her temples are muti- 
lated and discolored ruins, ancient Greece lives also in 
the song, the art, and the research of modern times. In 
contemplating the influence of her genius, the mind is 
naturally fixed upon the chief repository of her taste 
and talent — Athens, " the eye of Greece " — from which 
have sprung " all the strength, the wisdom, the freedom, 
and the glory of the western world." 

Within the surface of Time's fleeting river 

Its wrinkled image lies, as then it lay, 
Immovably unquiet, and forever 

It trembles, but it cannot pass away ! 
The voices of thy bards and sages thunder 
With an earth-awaking blast 
Through the caverns of the past ; 
Religion veils her eyes; Oppression shrinks aghast; 
A winged sound of joy, and love, and wonder, 
Which soars where Expectation never flew, 
Rending the veil of space and time asunder ! 

One ocean feeds the clouds, and streams, and dew ; 
One sun illumines heaven ; one spirit vast 
With life and love makes chaos ever new, 
As Athens doth the world with her delight renew. 

Shelley. - 

Of the splendid literature of Athens Lord Macaulay 
says, "It is a subject in which I love to forget the accu- 
racy of a judge in the veneration of a worshipper and 
the gratitude of a child." To Hellenic thought, as em- 



476 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

bodied and exemplified in the great works of Athenian 
genius, he rightly ascribes the establishment of an intelr 
lectual empire that is imperishable ; and from one of 
his valuable historical " Essays " we quote the following 
graphic delineation of what may be termed . 

The Immortal Influence of Athens. 

" If we consider, merely the subtlety of disquisition, 
the force of imagination, the perfect energy and ele- 
gance of expression, which characterize the great works 
of Athenian genius, we must pronounce them intrinsi- 
cally most valuable ; but what shall we say when we 
reflect that from hence have sprung, directly or indirect- 
ly, all the noblest creations of the human intellect? that 
from hence were the vast accomplishments and the 
brilliant fancy of Cicero, the withering fire of Juvenal, 
the plastic imagination of Dante, the humor of Cer- 
vantes, the comprehension of Bacon, the wit of Butler, 
the supreme and universal excellence of Shakspeare? 
All the triumphs of truth and genius over prejudice and 
power, in every country and in every age, have been 
the triumphs of Athens. Wherever a few great minds 
have made a stand against violence and fraud, in the 
cause of liberty and reason, there has been her spirit in 
the midst of them, inspiring, encouraging, consoling— 
by the lonely lamp of Erasmus ; by the restless bed of 
Pascal; in the tribune of Mirabeau ; in the cell of 
Galileo, and on the scaffold of Sidney. But who shall 
estimate her influence on private happiness? Who 
shall say how many thousands have been made wiser, 
happier, and better, by those pursuits in which she has 
taught mankind to engage? to how many the studies 
which took their rise from her have been wealth in 
poverty, liberty in bondage, health in sickness, society 
in solitude ? Her power is indeed manifested at the bar, 



CLOSING PERIOD OF LITERATURE AND ART. 477 

in the senate, on the field of battle, in the schools of 
philosophy. But these are not her glory. Wherever 
literature consoles sorrow or assuages pain — wherever 
it brings gladness to eyes which fail with wakefulness 
and tears, and ache for the dark house and the long" 
sleep — there is exhibited, in its noblest form, the im- 
mortal influence of Athens. 

" The dervis, in the Arabian tale, did not hesitate to 
abandon to his comrade the camels with their load of 
jewels and gold, while he retained the casket of that 
mysterious juice which enabled him to behold at one 
glance all the hidden riches of the universe. Surely it 
is no exaggeration to say that no external advantage is 
to be compared with that purification of the intellect- 
ual eye which gives us to contemplate the infinite wealth 
of the mental world ; all the hoarded treasures of the 
primeval dynasties, and all the shapeless ore of its yet 
unexplored mines. This is the gift of Athens to man. 
Her freedom and her power have been annihilated for 
more than twenty centuries; her people have degen- 
erated into timid slaves; 1 her language into a barbarous 
jargon ; her temples have been given up to the succes- 
sive depredations of Eomans, Turks, and Scotchmen ; 
but her intellectual empire is imperishable. And, when 
those who have rivalled her greatness shall have shared 
her fate; when civilization and knowledge shall have 
fixed their abode in distant continents; when the scep- 
tre shall have passed away from England ; when, per- 
haps, travellers from distant regions shall in vain labor 
to decipher on some mouldering pedestal the name of 
our proudest chief — shall hear savage hymns chanted 
to some misshapen idol over the ruined dome of our 
proudest temple, and shall see a single naked fisher- 



1 But this is not the character of the Athenians of the present day. 



478 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY, 

man wash his nets in the river of the ten thousand 
masts— the influence and glory of Athens will still sur- 
vive, fresh in eternal youth, exempt from mutability 
and decay, immortal as the intellectual principle from 
which they derived their origin, and over which they 
exercise their control.' 7 

Genius of Greece ! thou livest, though thy domes 
Ave fallen ; here, in this thy loved abode, 
Thine Athens, as I breathe the clear pure air 
Which thou hast breathed, climb the dark mountain's side 
Which thou hast trod, or in the temple's porch 
Pause on the sculptured beauties which thine eye 
Has often viewed delighted, I confess 
Thy nearer influence ; I feel thy power 
Exalting every wish to virtuous hope ; 
I hear thy solemn voice amid the crash 
Of fanes hurled prostrate by barbarian hands, 
Callino" me forth to tread with thee the paths 
Of wisdom, or to listen to thy harp 
Hymning immortal strains. 

Greece I though deserted are thy ports, and all 

Thy pomp and thy magnificence are shrunk 

Into a narrow circuit ; though thy gates 

Pour forth no more thy crested sons to war ; 

Though thy capacious theatres resound 

No longer with the replicated shouts 

Of multitudes ; although Philosophy 

Is silent 'mid thy porticos and groves ; 

Though Commerce heaves no more the pond'rous load, 

Or, thund'ring with her thousand cars, imprints 

Her footsteps on thy rocks ; though near thy fanes 

And marble monuments the peasant's hut 

Rears its low roof in bitter mockery 

Of faded splendor— yet shalt thou survive, 

Nor yield till time yields to eternity. Haygarth. 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 479 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 
I. GREECE UNDER THE ROMANS. 

The Romans conducted their administration of Greece 
with much wisdom and moderation, treating both its re- 
ligion and municipal institutions with great respect. As 
Mr. Finlay says, " Under these circumstances prudence 
and local interests would everywhere favor submission 
to Rome; national vanity alone would whisper incite- 
ments to venture on a struggle for independence." 1 But 
the latter induced the Greeks to attempt to regain their 
liberties at the time of the first Mithridatic war, about 
87 B.C. Bylla, the Roman general, marched into Greece 
at the head of a powerful army, and laid siege to Ath- 
ens, which made a desperate defence. At last, their re- 
sources exhausted, the Athenians sent a deputation of 
orators to negotiate with the old Roman ; and it" is stated 
that "their spokesman began to remind him of their 
past glory, and was proceeding to touch upon Marathon, 
when the surly soldier fiercely replied, ' I was sent here 
to punish rebels, not to study history.' And he did pun- 
ish them. Breaking down the wall, his soldiers poured 
into the city, and with drawn swords they swept through 
the streets." The severe losses sustained by Greece in 
this rebellion were never repaired. The same historian 
adds that both parties— Greeks and Romans — " inflicted 
severe injuries on Greece, plundered the country, and 

1 "History of Greece from 14G b.c. to a.b. 1864;" by George Finlay 
LL.D. 



7 



480 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

destroyed property most wantonly. The foundations of 
national prosperity were undermined ; and it hencefor- 
ward became impossible to save from the annual con- 
sumption of the inhabitants the sums necessary to re- 
place the accumulated capital of ages which this short 
war had annihilated. In some cases the wealth of the 
communities became insufficient to keep the existing 
public works in repair." 

Cilician pirates soon after commenced their depreda- 
tions, and ravaged both the main-land and the islands 
nntil'expelled by Pompey the Great. The civil wars that 
overthrew the Koman republic next added to the deso- 
lation of Greece ; but on the establishment of the Ko- 
man empire the country entered upon a career of peace 
and comparative prosperity. Says a late compiler, 1 "Au- 
gustus and his successors generally treated Greece with 
respect, and some of them distinguished her by splendid 
imperial favors. Trajan greatly improved her condition 
by his wise and liberal administration. Hadrian and the 
Antonines venerated her for her past achievements, and 
showed their good-will by the care they extended to her 
works of art, and their patronage of the schools." It 
was at this time, also, that the Christian religion was 
gaining great victories ' over the indifference of the peo- 
ple to their ancient rites,' and was thus essentially chang- 
ing the moral and intellectual condition of Greece. 
Aside from its power to fill the void in the heart that 
philosophy, though strengthening the intellect, could 
not reach, Christianity bore certain relations to the an- 
cient principles of government, that commended it to the 
acceptance of the Greeks. These relations, and their ef- 
fects, are thus explained by Db. Felton and a writer 
that he quotes : 2 - 



i Edward L.Burlingarae, Ph.D. 

a Lecture on " Greece under the Romans. 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 481 

"Besides the peculiar consolations afforded by Chris- 
tianity to the afflicted of all ranks and classes, there 
were popular elements in its early forms which could 
not fail to commend it to the regards of common men. 
It borrowed the designation ecclesia from the old popu- 
lar assembly, and liturgy from the services required by 
law of the richer citizens in the popular festivities. It 
taught the equality of all men in the sight of God ; and 
this doctrine could not fail to be affectionately welcomed 
by a conquered people. The Christian congregations 
were organized upon democratic principles, at least in 
Greece, and presented a semblance of the free assem- 
blies of former times ; and the daily business of commu- 
nities was, equally with their spiritual affairs, transacted 
under these popular forms. ' From the moment a peo- 
ple,' says a recent writer, 'in the state of intellectual 
civilization in which the Greeks were, could listen to the 
preachers, it was certain they would adopt the religion. 
They might alter, modify, or corrupt it, but it was im- 
possible they should reject it. The existence of an as- 
sembly in which the dearest interests of all human be- 
ings were expounded and discussed in the language of 
truth, and with the most earnest expressions of persua- 
sion, must have lent an irresistible charm to the investi- 
gation of the new doctrine among a people possessing 
the institutions and the feelings of the Greeks. Sin- 
cerity, truth, and a desire to persuade others, will soon 
create eloquence where numbers are gathered together. 
Christianity revived oratory, and witli oratory it awa- 
kened many of the characteristics which had slept for 
ages. The discussions of Christianity gave also new 
vigor to the commercial and municipal institutions, as 
they improved the intellectual qualities of the people.' " 

Among the imperial friends of Greece, whose reign 
has been characterized by some writers as " the last fort- 

21 



482 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

unate period in the sad annals of that country," was the 
Emperor Julian, known as "The Apostate." He as- 
cended the throne in 361 a.d. ; and, although he sought 
to overthrow Christianity and re-establish the pagan re- 
ligion, " he founded charities, aimed at the suppression 
of vice and profligacy, and was distinguished for his de- 
votion to the happiness of the people." Well educated 
in early life, he became an accomplished and cultured 
sovereign, " and in many ways manifested his passionate 
attachment to Greece, her literature, her institutions, and 
her arts." 



II. CHANGES DOWN TO THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY. 

On the establishment of the Eastern empire of the 
Romans, with Byzantium for its capital, the Greeks be- 
gan to exert a greater influence in the affairs of govern- 
ment, and, outside of the metropolis itself, the Roman 
spirit of the administration was gradually destroyed. In 
the third and fourth centuries Greece suffered from in- 
vasions by the Goths and Huns, and all apparent prog- 
ress was stopped ; but during the long reign of Justinian, 
from 527 to 565, many of its cities were embellished and 
fortified, and the pagan schools of Athens were closed. 
No farther events of importance affecting the condition 
of Greece occurred until the immigrations of the Slavo- 
nians and other barbarous races, in the sixth and eighth 
centuries. The population of Greece had dwindled rap- 
idly, and its revenues were so small that the Eastern em- 
perors cared little to defend it. Hence these northern, 
migratory hordes rapidly acquired possession of its soil. 
Finally this great body of settlers broke up into a num- 
ber of tribes and disappeared as a people, leaving be- 
hind them, however, still existing evidences of their in- 
fluence upon the country and its inhabitants. 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 483 



THE COURTS OF CRUSADING CHIEFTAINS. 

The next important changes in the affairs of Greece 
were wrought by warriors from the West. In 1081 the 
Norman, Robert Guiscard, and in 1146 Roger, King of 
Sicily, conquered portions of the county, including Cor- 
inth, Thebes, and Athens; and in the time of the fourth 
Crusade to the Holy Land (1203), when Constantinople 
was captured by Latin princes (1204), Greece became a 
prize for some of the most powerful crusading chieftains, 
under whose rule the courts of Thessaloni'ca, Athens, 
and the Peloponnesus attained to considerable celebri- 
ty even throughout Europe. " But their magnificence," 
says a writer in the Edinburgh Review, " was entirely 
modern. It centred wholly round their own persons 
and interests; and although the condition of the people 
was in no respects worse, in some respects palpably bet- 
ter, still they did but minister to the glory of the houses 
of Neri or Acciajuoli, or De la Roche or Brienne. The 
beautiful structures of Athens and the Acropolis were 
prized, not as heirlooms of departed greatness, but as 
the ornaments of a feudal court, and the rewards of 
successful valor." 

The Duchy of Athens was the most interesting and 
renowned of these Frankish kingdoms ; and in one of 
his lectures President Felton 1 points out the traces 
which this duchy has left here and there in modern 
literature. u The fame of the brilliant court of Ath- 
ens," he says, " resounded through the west of Europe, 
and many a chapter of old romance is filled with gor- 
geous pictures of its splendors. One of the heroines 
of Boccacio's Decameron, in the course of her adventu- 
rous life, is found at Athens, inspiring the duke by her 



i Lecture on "Turkish Conquest of Constantinople." 



484 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

charms. Dan'te was a contemporary of Guy II. and 
Walter de Brienne ; and in his Divina Commedia he 
applies to Theseus, King of ancient Athens, the title so 
familiar to him, borne by the princely rulers in his own 
day. Chaucer, too— the bright herald of English poetry 
—had often heard of the dukes of Athens; and he too, 
like Dante, gives the title to Theseus. Finally, in the 
age of Elizabeth, when Italian poetry was much studied 
by scholars and courtiers, Shakspeare, in the delightful 
scenes of the Midsummer Night's Bream, introduces 
Theseus, Duke of Athens, as the conqueror and the 
lover of Hippol'yta, the warrior-queen of the Amazons." 

Theseus. Hippolyta, I wooed thee with my sword, 
And won thy love, doing thee injuries ; 
But I will wed thee in another key, 
With pomp, with triumph, and with revelling. 

Act I. Scene I. 

THE TURKISH INVASION. 

Some of these Latin principalities and dukedoms ex- 
isted until they were swept away by the Turks, who, 
after the fall of Constantinople and the Byzantine Em- 
pire in 1453, by degrees obtained possession of Greece. 

Then, Greece, the tempest rose that burst on thee, 
Land of the bard, the warrior, and the sage ! 
Oh, where were then thy sons, the great, the free, 
Whose deeds are guiding stars from age to age ? 
Though firm thy battlements of crags and snows, 
And bright the memory of thy days of pride, 
In mountain might though Corinth's fortress rose, 
On, unresisted, rolled th' invading tide ! 
Oh ! vain the rock, the rampart, and the tower, 
If Freedom guard them not with Mind's unconquered power. 

Where were th' avengers then, whose viewless might 
Preserved inviolate their awful fane, 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 485 

When through the steep defiles to Delphi's height 
In martial splendor poured the Persian's train? 
Then did those mighty and mysterious Powers, 
Armed with the elements, to vengeance wake, 
Call the dread storms to darken round their towers, 
Hurl down the rocks, and bid the thunders break; 
Till far around, with deep and fearful clang, 
Sounds of unearthly war through wild Parnassus rang. 

Where was the spirit of the victor-throng, 
Whose tombs are glorious by Scamander's tide, 
Whose names are bright in everlasting song, 
The lords of war, the praised, the deified ? 
W T here he, the hero of a thousand lays, 
AVho from the dead at Marathon arose 
All armed, and, beaming on th' Athenian's gaze, 
A battle-meteor, guided to their foes ? 
Or they whose forms, to Alaric's awe-struck eye, 1 
Hovering o'er Athens, blazed in airy panoply ? 

Ye slept, oh heroes ! chief ones of the earth — 

High demi-gods of ancient days — ye slept. 

There lived no spark of your ascendant worth, 

When o'er your land the victor Moslem swept ; 

No patriot then the sons of freedom led, 

In mountain-pass devotedly to die ; 

The martyr-spirit of resolve was fled, 

And the high soul's unconquered buoyancy ; 

And by your graves, and on your battle-plains, 

Warriors, your children knelt, to wear the stranger's chains. 

Mrs. Hemans. 

1 Gibbon says : "From Thermopylae to Sparta the leader of the Goths 
(Alaric) pursued his victorious march without encountering any mortal 
antagonist; but one of the advocates of expiring paganism has confidently 
asserted that the walls of Athens were guarded by the goddess Minerva 
with her formidable aegis, and by the angry phantom of Achilles ; and that 
the conqueror was dismayed by the presence of the hostile deities of 
Greece." But Gibbon characteristically adds, " The Christian faith which 
Alaric had devotedly embraced taught him to despise the imaginary dei- 
ties of Rome and Athens."— Milman's " Gibbon's Rome," vol. ii., p. 215. 



486 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

III. CONTESTS BETWEEN THE TURKS AND VENETIANS. 

Greece was long the scene of severe contests between 
the Turks and the Venetians. Athens was first captured 
by the Turks in 1456, but they were driven from it in 
1467 by the Venetians, who were in turn expelled from 
the city by the Turks in 1470. But Venice, as a French 
historian— Comte de Laboukde— has observed, "Alone 
of the states of Europe could feel, from a merely mate- 
rial point of view, the force of the blow struck at Europe 
and her own commerce by the submission of almost the 
whole of Greece to Turkish rule ;" and this feeling sur- 
vived many centuries. In 1670 the Turks conquered 
Crete from the Venetians, and in 1684 the latter retalia- 
ted by offensive operations against the Peloponnesus, 
which was soon reconquered by the Venetian admiral 
Morosini. In 1687 Morosini crowned his successes by 
the capture of Athens. The Turkish garrison had re- 
tired to the Acropolis, and the victory is principally of 
interest on account of the irreparable injury done to the 
works of art on that " rock-shrine of Athens." Although 
he subsequently sought to evade all responsibility for 
the desolation that ensued, it was Morosini who directed 
his batteries to hurl their fatal burdens against the Acrop- 
olis, and it was he who afterward robbed it of many of 
its treasures. Hitherto the alterations made for military 
purposes, and the slight injuries inflicted at various 
times, had not marred the general beauty and effect of 
its buildings ; but when the troops of Venice entered 
Athens, the Parthenon and others of that gorgeous as- 
semblage of structures were in ruins, and the glory of 
the Athenian Acropolis survived only in the past. ^ Con- 
trasting its past glory and its present decay, a writer in 
a recent Review makes these interesting observations : 
"No other fortress has embraced so much beauty and 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE KOMAN CONQUEST. 487 

splendor within its walls, and none lias witnessed a series 
of more startling and momentous changes in the fort- 
unes of its possessors. Wave after wave of war and 
conquest has beaten against it. The city which lies at 
its feet has fallen beneath the assaults of the Persian, the 
Spartan, the Macedonian, the Roman, the Goth, the Cru- 
sader, and the Turk. Through all these and other vicis- 
situdes the Acropolis passed, changing only in the char- 
acter of its occupants, unchanged in its loveliness and 
splendor. With a few blemishes and losses, whether 
from the decaying taste of later times or the occasional 
robberies of a foreign conqueror, but unaffected in its 
general aspect, it presented to the eyes of the victorious 
Ottoman the same front of unparalleled beauty which it 
had displayed in the days of Pericles. To him who 
looks upon it now, however, the scene is changed indeed 
— changed not only in the loss of its treasures of decora- 
tive art (for of many of these it had been robbed before), 
but with its loveliest fabrics shattered, many reduced to 
hopeless ruin, and not a few utterly obliterated. Less 
than two centuries sufficed to bring about all this dilap- 
idation : less than three months sufficed to complete the 
ruin. If the Venetian, by his abortive conquest, inflicted 
not more injury on the fair heritage of Athenian art 
than it had undergone from all preceding spoliations, he 
left it, not merely from the havoc of war, but by wanton 
subsequent mutilation, in that state which rendered the 
recovery of its ancient grace and majesty impossible." 

The Venetians evacuated Athens in 1688, and a few 
years subsequently the Peloponnesus was their only 
possession in Greece. In 1715 a Turkish army of one 
hundred thousand men under Al'i Coumour'gi, the 
Grand Vizier of Aeh'met III., invaded the Peloponne- 
sus, and first attacked Corinth. Historians tell us that 



488 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the garrison, weakened by several unsuccessful attacks, 
opened negotiations for a surrender ; but, while these 
were in progress, the accidental firing of a magazine in 
the Turkish camp so enraged the infidels that they at 
once broke off the negotiations, stormed and captured 
the city, and put most of the garrison, with Signor 
Minotti, the commander, to the sword. Those taken 
prisoners were reserved for execution under the walls 
of Nauplia, within sight of the Venetians. 

In Byeon's Siege of Corinth, founded on the historical 
narrative, a poetical license is taken, and the death of 
Minotti and the remnant of his followers is attributed 
to the explosion of a powder-magazine fired by Minotti 
himself. From the fine descriptions which this poem 
contains we extract the following verses: 

The Siege and Fall of Corinth. 

On dim Cithseron's ridge appears 
The gleam of twice ten thousand spears ; 
And downward to the Isthmian plain, 
From shore to shore of either main, 
The tent is pitched, the crescent shines 
Along the Moslem's leaguering lines ; 
And the dusk Spa/hi' s bands advance 
Beneath each bearded pa'sha's glance ; 
And far and wide as eye can reach 
The turbaned cohorts throng the beach ; 
And there the Arab's camel kneels, 
And there his steed the Tartar wheels ; 
The Turcoman has left his herd, 
The sabre round his loins to gird ; 
And there the volleying thunders pour, 
Till waves grow smoother to the roar. 
The trench is dug, the cannon's breath 
Wings the far hissing globe of death ; 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 489 

Fast whirl the fragments from the wall, 
Which crumbles with the ponderous ball ; 
And from that wall the foe replies, 
O'er dusty plain and smoky skies, 
"With fires that answer fast and well 
The summons of the Infidel. 

The walls grew weak ; and fast and hot 

Against them poured the ceaseless shot, 

With unabating fury sent 

From battery to battlement ; 

And thunder-like the pealing din 

Rose from each heated culverin ; 

And here and there some crackling dome 

Was fired before the exploding bomb ; 

And as the fabric sank beneath 

The shattering; shell's volcanic breath, 

In red and wreathing columns flashed 

The flame, as loud the ruin crashed, 

Or into countless meteors driven, 

Its earth-stars melted into heaven — 

AVhose clouds that day grew doubly dun, 

Impervious to the hidden sun, 

With volumed smoke that slowly grew 

To one wide sky of sulphurous hue. 

Having made a breach in the walls, as morning dawns 
the Turks form in line, and wait for the word to storm 
the intrenchments. Coumourgi addresses them — the 
command is given, and with the irresistible force of an 
avalanche the infidels pour into Corinth. 

Tartar, and Spahi, and Turcoman, 
Strike your tents and throng to the van ; 
Mount ye, spur ye, skirr the plain, 
That the fugitive may flee in vain 
When he breaks from the town ; and none escape, 
Aged or young, in the Christian shape ; 

21* 



490 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

While your fellows on foot, in a fiery mass, 

Bloodstain the breach through which they pass. 

The steeds are all bridled, and snort to the rein ; 

Curved is each neck, and flowing each mane ; 

White is the foam of their champ on the bit : 

The spears are uplifted, the matches are lit, 

The cannon are pointed, and ready to roar, 

And crush the wall they have crumbled before : 

The khan and the pashas are all at their post ; 

The vizier himself at the head of the host. 

When the culverin's signal is fired, then on ; 

Leave not in Corinth a living one — 

A priest at her altars, a chief in her halls, 

A hearth in her mansions, a stone on her walls. 

God and the prophet— Alia Hu ! 

Up to the skies with that wild halloo ! 

"There the breach lies for passage, the ladder to scale ; 

And your hands on your sabres, and how should ye fail? 

He who first downs with the red cross may crave 

His heart's dearest wish ; let him ask it, and have !" 

Thus uttered Coumourgi, the dauntless vizier ; 

The reply was the brandish of sabre and spear, 

And the shout of fierce thousands in joyous ire ; 

Silence — hark to the signal — fire ! 

* * * * * 

As the spring-tides, with heavy plash, 

From the cliffs invading, dash 

Huge fragments, sapped by the ceaseless flow, 

Till white and thundering down they go, 

Like the avalanche's snow, 

On the Alpine vales below ; 

Thus at length, outbreathed and worn, 

Corinth's sons were downward borne 

By the long and oft renewed 

Charo-e of the Moslem multitude. 

In firmness they stood, and in masses they fell, 

Heaped, by the host of the infidel, 



GKEECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 491 

Hand to hand, and foot to foot : 
Nothing there, save death, was mute ; 
Stroke, and thrust, and flash, and cry 
For quarter, or for victory, 
Mingle there with the volleying thunder, 
Which makes the distant cities wonder 
How the sounding battle goes, 
If with them or for their foes. 

From the point of encountering blades to the hilt 

Sabres and swords with blood were gilt ; 

But the rampart is won, and the spoil begun, 

And all but the after-carnage done. 

Shriller shrieks now mingling come 

From within the plundered dome : 

Hark to the haste of flying feet, 

That splash in the blood of the slippery street ; 

But here and there, where 'vantage ground 

Against the foe may still be found, 

Desperate groups of twelve or ten 

Make a pause, and turn again — 

"With banded backs against the wall 

Fiercely stand, or fighting fall. 

Minotti, though an old man, has an " arm full of 
might," and he disputes, foot by foot, the successful and 
deadly onslaughts of the Turks. He finally retires, with 
the remnant of his gallant band, to the fortified church, 
where lie the last and richest spoils sought by the infi- 
dels, and in the vaults beneath which, lined with the 
dead of ages gone, was also "the Christians' chiefest 
magazine." To the latter a train had been laid, and, 
seizing a blazing torch, his " last and stern resource," 

Darkly, sternly, and all alone, 
Minotti stands o'er the altar-stone, 

and awaits the last attack of his foes. It soon comes. 



492 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

So near they came, the nearest stretched 
To grasp the spoil he almost reached, 

When old Minotti's hand 
Touched with the torch the train— 

'Tis fired ! 
Spire, vaults, the shrine, the spoil, the slain, 
The turbaned victors, the Christian band, 
All that of living or dead remain, 
Hurled on high with the shivered fane, 

In one wild roar expired ! 
The shattered town, the walls thrown down, 
The waves a moment backward bent — 
The hills that shake, although unrent, 

As if an earthquake passed — 
The thousand shapeless things all driven 
In cloud and flame athwart the heaven, 

By that tremendous blast — 

Proclaimed the desperate conflict o'er 

On that too long afflicted shore : 

Up to the sky like rockets go 

All that mingled there below : 

Many a tall and goodly man, 

Scorched and shrivelled to a span, 

When he fell to earth again 

Like a cinder strewed the plain : 

Down the ashes shower like rain ; 

Some fell in the gulf, which received the sprinkles 

With a thousand circling wrinkles ; 

Some fell on the shore, but, far away, 

Scattered o'er the isthmus lay. 

* * * * * 

All the living things that heard 
That deadly earth-shock disappeared ; 
The wild birds flew ; the wild dogs fled, 
And howling left the unburied dead ; 
The camels from their keepers broke, 
The distant steer forsook the yoke — 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 493 

The nearer steed plunged o'er the plain, 
And burst his girth, and tore his rein ; 
The bull-frog's note, from out the marsh, 
Deep-mouthed arose, and doubly harsh 
The wolves yelled on the caverned hill, 
Where echo rolled in thunder still ; 
The jackal's troop, in gathered cry, 
Bayed from afar complainingly, 
With a mixed and mournful sound, . 
Like crying babe, and beaten hound : 
With sudden wing and ruffled breast 
The eagle left his rocky nest, 
And mounted nearer to the sun, 
The clouds beneath him seemed so dun ; 
Their smoke assailed his startled beak, 
And made him higher soar and shriek. 
Thus was Corinth lost and won ! 



IV. FINAL CONQUEST OF GREECE BY TURKEY. 

The fall of Corinth opened the way to a successful 
advance of the Turkish forces through the Peloponne- 
sus, and the Venetians were soon compelled to abandon 
it. By the peace of Passa/rowitz, in 1718, the whole of 
Greece was again surrendered to Turkey, and under her 
rule the country, divided into military districts called 
Pasha'lics, sunk into a deplorable condition which the 
progress of time did nothing to ameliorate. The Greeks, 
being virtually reduced to bondage, suffered untold mis- 
eries from the rapacity and barbarism of their masters. 
Says the historian, Sir Emerson Tennent, "So unde- 
fined was the system of extortion, and so uncontrolled 
the power of those to whose execution it was intrusted, 
that the evil spread over the whole sj^stem of adminis- 
tration, and insinuated itself with a polypous fertility 



494 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

into every relation and ordinance of society, till there 
were few actions or occupations of the Greeks that were 
not burdened with the scrutiny and interference of their 
masters, and none that did not suffer, in a greater or less 
degree, from their heartless rapine." For four centuries 
and over the Greeks suffered under this despotism, which 
stamped out industry and education, and tended to the 
extinction of every manly trait in the people, while it 
also developed the native vices of the Hellenic char- 
acter. 

In a poem written in 1786 by the afterward celebrated 
British statesman, George Canning, the writer, after 
paying a handsome tribute to the greatness and glory of 
the Greece of olden time, draws the following truthful 
picture of her degeneracy in his own day : 

The Slavery of Greece. 

Oh, how changed thy fame, 
And all thy glories fading into shame ! 
What ! that thy bold, thy freedom-breathing land 
Should crouch beneath a tyrant's stern command ! 
That servitude should bind in galling chain 
Whom Asia's millions once opposed in vain, 
Who could have thought ? Who sees without a groan 
Thy cities mouldering and thy walls o'erthrown ; 
That where once towered the stately, solemn fane, 
Now moss-grown ruins strew the ravaged plain ; 
And, unobserved but by the traveller's eye, 
Proud, vaulted domes in fretted fragments lie ; 
And the fallen column, on the dusty ground, 
Pale ivy throws its sluggish arms around ? 

Thy sons (sad change !) in abject bondage sigh ; 
Unpitied toil, and unlamented die ; 
Groan at the labors of the galling oar, 
Or the dark caverns of the mine explore. 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 495 

The glittering tyranny of Othman's sons, 

The pomp of horror which surrounds their thrones, 

Have awed their servile spirits into fear ; 

Spurned by the foot, they tremble and revere. 

The day of labor, night's sad, sleepless hour, 

The inflictive scourge of arbitrary power, 

The bloody terror of the pointed steel, 

The murderous stake, the ao-onizina' wheel, 

And (dreadful choice !) the bowstring or the bowl, 

Damps their faint vigor and unmans the soul. 

Disastrous fate ! Still tears will fill the eye, 

Still recollection prompt the mournful sigh, 

When to the mind recurs thy former fame, 

And all the horrors of thy present shame. 

In 1810-11 the poet Byron spent considerable time 
in Greece, visiting its many scenes of historic interest, 
and noting the condition of its people. Here he wrote 
the second canto of Childe Harold, in which the follow- 
ing fine apostrophe and appeal to Greece, still under 
Moslem rule, are found : 

Fair Greece ! sad relic of departed worth ! 
Immortal, though no more ; though fallen, great ! 
Who now shall lead thy scattered children forth, 
And lono* accustomed bondage uncreate ? 
Not such thy sons who whilom did await, 
The hopeless warriors of a willing doom, 
In bleak Thermopylae's sepulchral strait — 
Oh, who that gallant spirit shall resume, 
Leap from Euro'ta's banks, and call thee from the tomb ? 

Spirit of Freedom ! when on Phy'le's brow 
Thou sat'st with Thrasybu'lus and his train, 
Couldst thou forebode the dismal hour which now 
Dims the green beauties of thine Attic plain ? 



496 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Not thirty tyrants now enforce the chain, 
But every carle can lord it o'er thy land ; 
Nor rise thy sons, but idly rail in vain, 
Trembling beneath the scourge of Turkish hand, 
From birth till death enslaved ; in word, in deed, unmanned. 

In all, save form alone, how changed ! and who 
That marks the fire still sparkling in each eye, 
Who but would de'em their bosoms burned anew 
With thy unquenched beam, lost Liberty ! 
And many dream withal the hour is nigh 
That gives them back their father's heritage : 
For foreign arms and aid they fondly sigh, 
Nor solely dare encounter hostile rage, 
Or tear their name defiled from Slavery's mournful page. 

Hereditary bondsmen ! know ye not 
Who would be free themselves must strike the blow ? 
By their right arms the conquest must be wrought ? 
Will Gaul or Muscovite redress thee ? No ! 
True, they may lay your proud despoilers low, 
But not for you will Freedom's altars flame. 
Shades of the Helots ! triumph o'er your foe ! 
Greece ! change thy lords, thy state is still the same ; 
Thy glorious day is o'er, but not thy years of shame. 

* * * * * * 

When riseth Lacedsemon's hardihood, 
When Thebes Epaminondas rears again, 
When Athens' children are with hearts endued, 
When Grecian mothers shall give birth to men, 
Then may'st thou be restored ; but not till then. 
A thousand years scarce serve to form a state ; 
An hour may lay it in the dust : and when 
Can man, in shattered splendor renovate, 
Recall its virtues back, and vanquish Time and Fate? 



? 



GEEECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 497 



FIRST STEPS TO SECURE LIBERTY. 

Although the oppressive domination of the Turks was 
tamely submitted to for so many centuries, the Greeks 
did not entirely lose their national spirit, nor their de- 
votion to their religion and their domestic institutions 
and long before Byron wrote, Greece began preparations 
to break the Turkish yoke. The preservation of the na- 
tional spirit was largely due to the warlike inhabitants of 
the mountainous regions of the north, who maintained 
their independence against the bloody tyranny of the 
Turks, and continually harassed their camps and vil- 
lages. These mountaineers were known as KlejMs ; and 
though they were literally robbers, ofttimes plundering 
the Greeks as well as the Turks, yet, on the decline 
of the Armato'li — the Christian local militia which the 
Turks attempted to crush out — the Klephts acquired po- 
litical and social importance as a permanent class in 
the Greek nation ; and, as Dk. Felton says, " When 
the Eevolution broke out, the courage, temperance, and 
hardihood of these bands were among the most effective 
agencies in rescuing Greece from the blighting tyranny 
of the Turks." This writer characterizes the ballads of 
the Klephts as " full of fire, and redolent of the moun- 
tain life, which had an irresistible charm for young and 
adventurous spirits chafing under the domination of the 
Turks in the lowlands ;" and to him we are indebted for 
a literal version of one of these ballads, representing the 
feelings of a young man who had resolved to leave his 
mother's home and betake himself to the mountains, and 
"illustrating at once the impatient spirit of rebellion 
against the Turks, and the sweet flow of natural poetry 
which was ever welling up in the hearts of the people." x 

1 This ballad is taken from "a collection published by Zampelios, a 
Greek gentleman, and a native of Leucadia." 



498 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" ' Mother, I can no longer be a slave to the Turks ; 
I cannot— my heart fights against it. I will take my 
gun and go and become a Klepht; to dwell on the 
mountains, among the lofty ridges ; to have the woods 
for my companions, and my converse with the beasts ; 
to have the snow for ray covering, the rocks for my 
bed ; with sons of the Klephts to have my daily habita- 
tion. I will go, mother, and do not weep, but give me 
thy prayer. And we will pray, my dear mother, that I 
may slaughter many a Turk. Plant the rose, and plant 
the dark carnation, and give them sugar and musk to 
drink ; and as long, O mother mine, as the flowers blos- 
som and put forth, thy son is not dead, but is warring 
with the Turks. But if a day of sorrow come, a day 
of woe, and the plants fade away, and the flowers fail, 
then I too shall have been slain, and thou must clothe 
thyself in black.' 

"Twelve years passed, and five months, while the 
roses blossomed and the buds bloomed ; and one spring 
morning, the first of May, when the birds were singing 
and heaven was smiling, at once it thundered and light- 
ened, and grew dark. The carnation sighed, the rose 
wept, both withered away together, and the flowers fell ; 
and with them the hapless mother became a lifeless 
heap of earth." 

The last half of the eighteenth century witnessed, in 
Greece, the first general desire for liberty. Secret so- 
cieties were formed to aid in the emancipation of the 
country, and "eminent writers, at home and abroad, 
appealed to the glorious recollections of Greece in order 
to excite a universal enthusiasm for freedom." Among 
the latter may be mentioned Constantinos Khigas, a 
native of Thessaly, born in 1753, a man of fine accom- 
plishments and an ardent patriot, whose lyric ballads 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 499 

are said to have " rung through Greece like a trumpet," 
and who has been styled "the Tyrtae'us of modern 
Greece." One of his war-songs has been thus trans- 
lated : 

Sons of the Greeks, arise ! 

The glorious hour's gone forth, 
And, worthy of such ties, 

Display who gave us birth. 
* * * * 

Then manfully despising 

The Turkish tyrant's yoke, 
Let your country see you rising, 

And all her chains are broke. 
Brave shades of chiefs and sao-es. 

Behold the coining strife ! 
Hellenes of past ages, 

Oh start again to life! 
At the sound of ray trumpet, breaking 

Your sleep, oh join with me ! 
And the seven-hilled city 1 seeking, 

Fight, conquer, till we're free. 

Sparta, Sparta, why in slumbers 

Lethargic dost thou lie? 
Awake, and join thy numbers 

With Athens, old ally ! 
Leonidas recalling, 

That chief of ancient sonsf, 
Who saved ye once from falling — 

The terrible ! the strong ! 
Who made that bold diversion 

In old .Thermopylae, 
And warring with the Persian 

To keep his country free ; 



1 Constantinople. 



500 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

With his three hundred waging 

The battle, long he stood, 
And, like a lion raging, 

Expired in seas of blood. Trans, by Byron. 

Another poet, Polyzois, writes in a similar vein : 

Friends and countrymen, shall we 
Slaves of Moslems ever be, 
Of the old barbaric band, 
Tyrants o'er Hellenic land ? 
Draws the hour of vengeance nigh — 
Vengeance ! be our battle-cry. 

It may be stated that Khigas, having visited Yienna 
with the hope of rousing the wealthy Greek residents 
of that city to immediate action, was barbarously sur- 
rendered to the Turks by the Austrian government. 
On the way to execution he broke from his guards and 
killed two of them, but was overpowered and imme- 
diately beheaded. ,_ 

V. THE GREEK REVOLUTION. 

The various efforts made by the Greeks in behalf of 
freedom, or, as more comprehensively stated by a re- 
cent writer, "The constancy with which they clung to 
the Christian Church during four centuries of misery 
and political annihilation; their immovable faithfulness 
to their nationality under intolerable oppression; the 
intellectual superiority they never failed to exhibit over 
their tyrants; the love of humane letters which they 
never, in all their sorrows, lost; and the wise prepara- 
tion they made for the struggle by means of schools, 
and by the circulation of editions of their own ancient 
authors, and translations of the most instructive works 
in modern literature "—these were the influences which 
finally impelled the Greeks to seek their restoration in 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 501 

armed insurrection, that first broke out in the spring of 
1821, and that ushered in the great Greek Eevolution. 
On the 7th of March Alexander Ypsilanti, a Greek, who 
had been a major-general in the Eussian army, pro- 
claimed from Moldavia the independence of Greece, and 
assured his countrymen of the aid of Kussia in the ap- 
proaching contest. But the Enssian emperor declined 
intervention; and the Porte took the most vigorous 
measures against the Greeks, calling upon all Mussul- 
men to arm against the rebels for the protection of 
Islamism. The wildest fanaticism raged in Constanti- 
nople, where thousands of resident Greeks were remorse- 
lessly murdered ; and in Moldavia the bloody struggle 
was terminated by the annihilation of the patriot army, 
and the flight of Ypsilanti to Trieste, where the Aus- 
trian government seized and imprisoned him. 

In southern Greece, however, no cruelties could 
quench the fire of liberty; and sixteen days after the 
proclamation of Ypsilanti the revolution of the Morea 
began at Suda, a large village in the northern part of 
Acha'ia, and spread over Achaia and the islands of the 
iEge'an. The ancient names were revived ; and on the 
6th of April the Messenian senate, assembled at Kala- 
ma'ta, proclaimed that Greece had shaken off the Turkish 
yoke to preserve the Christian faith and restore the an- 
cient character of the country. A formal address was 
made by that body to the people of the United States, 
and was forwarded to this country. It declared that, 
" having deliberately resolved to live or die for freedom, 
the Greeks were drawn by an irresistible impulse to the 
people of the United.States." In that early stage of the 
struggle, however, the address failed to excite that sym- 
pathy which, as we shall see farther on, the progress of 
events and a better understanding of the situation finally 
awakened. 



502 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

During the summer months the Turks committed 
great depredations among the Greek towns on the coast 
of Asia Minor ; the inhabitants of the Island of Candia, 
who had taken no part in the insurrection, were dis- 
armed, and their archbishop and other prelates were 
murdered. The most barbarous atrocities were also 
committed at Khodes and other islands of the Grecian 
Archipelago, where the villages were burned and the 
country desolated. But in August the Greeks captured 
the strong Turkish fortresses of Monembasi'a and Nava- 
ri'no, and in October that of Tripolit'za, and took a ter- 
rible revenge upon their enemies. In Tripolitza alone 
eight thousand Turks were put to death. The excesses 
of the Turks showed to the Greeks that their struggle 
was one of life and death ; and it is not surprising, there- 
fore, that they often retaliated when the power was in 
their hands. In September of the same year the Greek 
general Ulysses defeated a large Turkish army near the 
Pass of Thermopylae ; but, on the other hand, the penin- 
sula of Cassandra, the ancient Pelle'ne, was taken by the 
Turks, and over three thousand Greeks were put to the 
sword. The Athenian Acropolis was seized and gar- 
risoned by the Turks, and the people of Athens, as in 
I olden time, fled to Sal'amis for safety; but in general, 
throughout all southern Greece, the close of the year 
saw the Turks driven from the country districts and 
| shut up in the principal cities. 

A PROPHETIC VISION OF THE STRUGGLE. 

When the revolution of the Greeks broke out the 
English poet Shelley was residing in Italy. It was 
during the first year of the war that Shelley, filled with 
enthusiasm for the Greek cause, wrote, from the scanty 
materials that were then accessible, his beautiful dra- 
matic poem of Hellas ; and although he could at that 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 503 

time narrate but few events of the struggle, yet his 
prophecies of the final result came true in their general 
import. Forming his poem on the basis of the Per- 
sians of iEschylus, the scene opens with a chorus of 
Greek captive women, who thus sing of the course of 
Freedom, from the earliest ages until the light of her 
glory returns to rest upon and renovate their benighted 
land : 

In the great morning of the world 

The Spirit of God with might unfurled 

The flag of Freedom over Chaos, 
And all its banded anarchs fled, 

Like vultures frightened from Ima'us, 1 
Before an earthquake's tread. 

- 

So from Time's tempestuous dawn 
Freedom's splendor burst and shone : 
Thermopylae and Marathon 
Caught, like mountains beacon-lighted, 

The springing fire. The winged glorv 
On PhilippP half alighted 

Like an eagle on a promontory. 

Its unwearied wings could fan 
The quenchless ashes of Milan. 3 
From age to age, from man to man 

It lived ; and lit, from land to land, 

Florence, Albion, Switzerland. 4 



1 A Scythian mountain-range. 

2 The republican Romans, under Brutus and Cassius, were defeated here 
by Octavius and Mark Antony, 42 B.C. 

3 Milan was the centre of the resistance of the Lombard league against 
the Austrian tyrant Frederic Barbarossa. The latter, in 1162, burned the 
city to the ground ; but liberty lived in its ashes, and it rose, like an exha- 
lation, from its ruins. 

4 Florence freed itself from the power of the Ghibelline nobles, and be- 
came a free republic in 1250. Albion— England : Magna Charta wrested 
from King John : the Commonwealth. Switzerland: the great victory of 
Mogartcn, in 1315, led to the compact of the three cantons, thus formin<>- 
the nucleus of the Swiss Confederation. 



504 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

Then night fell ; and, as from night, 

Re-assuring fiery flight 

From the West swift Freedom came, 1 

Against the course of heaven and doom, 
A second sun, arrayed in flame, 

To burn, to kindle, to illume. 
From far Atlantis 2 its young beams 
Chased the shadows and the dreams. 

France, with all her sanguine streams, 
Hid, but quenched it not ; 3 again, 
Through clouds, its shafts of glory rain 
From utmost Germany to Spain. 4 
As an eagle, fed with morning, 
Scorns the embattled tempest's warning, 
When she seeks her aerie hanging 

In the mountain cedar's hair, 
And her brood expect the clanging 

Of her wings through the wild air, 
Sick with famine ; Freedom, so, 
To what of Greece remaineth, now 
Returns ; her hoary ruins glow 
Like orient mountains lost in day ; 

Beneath the safety of her wings 
Her renovated nurslings play, 

And in the naked lightnings 
Of truth they purge their dazzled eyes. 
Let Freedom leave, where'er she flies, 
A desert, or a paradise ; 

Let the beautiful and the brave 

Share her glory or a grave. 
In the farther prosecution of his narrative, the poet 
represents the Turkish Sultan, Mahraoud, as being 



i The American Revolution. 

2 The fabled Atlantis of Plato ; here used for America. 

s Referring to the French Revolution. 

4 Referring to the revolutions that broke out about the year 1S~U. 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 505 

strongly moved by dreams of the threatened overthrow 
of his power ; and he accordingly sends for Ahasuerus, 
an aged Jew, to interpret them. In the mean time the 
chorus of women sings the final triumph of the Cross 
over the crescent, and the fleeing away of the dark 
"powers of earth and air" before the advancing light 
of the " Star of Bethlehem :" 

A power from the unknown God, 
A Promethean conqueror came ; 
Like a triumphal path he trod 
The thorns of death and shame. 

A mortal shape to him 

Was like the vapor dim 
Which the orient planet animates with light ; 

Hell, sin, and slavery came, 

Like bloodhounds mild and tame, 
Nor preyed until their lord had taken flight. 

The moon of Ma'homet 

Arose, and it shall set ; 
While, blazoned as on heaven's immortal noon, 

The Crossjeads generations on. 

Swift as the radiant shapes of sleep, 

From one whose dreams are paradise, 
Fly, when the fond wretch wakes to weep, 
And day peers forth with her black eyes ; 

So fleet, so faint, so fair, 

The powers of earth and air 
Fled from the rising Star of Bethlehem. 

Apollo, Pan, and Love, 

And even Olympian Jove 
Grew weak, for killing Truth had glared on them. 

Onr hills, and seas, and streams, 

Dispeopled of their dreams — 
Their waters turned to blood, their dew to tears — 

Wailed for the golden years. 

22 



506 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 



In the language of Hassan, an attendant of Makmoud, 
the poet then summarizes the events attending the open- 
ing of the struggle, giving a picture of the course of 
European politics — Egypt sending her armies and fleets 
to aid the Sultan against the rebel world; England, 
Queen of Ocean, upon her island throne, holding her- 
self aloof from the contest; Eussia, indifferent whether 
Greece or Turkey conquers, but watching to stoop upon 
the victor; and Austria, while hating freedom, yet fear- 
ing the success of freedom's enemies. The poet could 
not foresee that change in English politics which subse- 
quently permitted England, aided by France and Russia, 
to interfere in behalf of Greece. Hassan says : 

" The anarchies of Africa unleash 

Their tempest- winged cities of the sea, 

To speak in thunder to the rebel world. 

Like sulphurous clouds, half shattered by the storm, 

They sweep the pale iEgean, while the Queen 

Of Ocean, bound upon her island throne, 

Far in the West, sits mourning that her sons, 

Who frown on Freedom, spare a smile for thee : 

Eussia still hovers, as an eagle might 

Within a cloud, near which a kite and crane 

Hang tangled in inextricable fight, 

To stoop upon the victor ; for she fears 

The name of Freedom, even as she hates thine ; 

But recreant Austria loves thee as the grave 

Loves pestilence; and her slow dogs of war, 

Fleshed with the chase, come up from Italy, 

And howl upon their limits ; for they see 

The panther Freedom fled to her old cover 

Amid seas and mountains, and a, mightier brood 

Crouch around." 

Although Hassan recounts the numbers of the Sul- 
tan's armies, and the strength of his forts and arsenals, 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 507 

yet the desponding Hahmoud, watching the declining 
moon, thus symbolizes it as the wan emblem of his 
fading power: 

" Look, Hassan, on yon crescent moon, emblazoned 
Upon that shattered flag of fiery cloud 
Which leads the rear of the departing day, 
Wan emblem of an empire fading now ! 
See how it trembles in the blood-red air, 
And, like a mighty lamp whose oil is spent, 
Shrinks on the horizon's edge — while, from above, 
One star, with insolent and victorious light 
Hovers above its fall, and with keen beams, 
Like arrows through a fainting antelope, 
Strikes its weak form to death." 

As messenger after messenger approaches, and in- 
forms the Sultan of the revolutionary risings in differ- 
ent parts of his empire, he refuses to hear more, and 
takes refuge in that fatalistic philosophy which is an 
unfailing resource of the followers of the Prophet in 
all their reverses : 

" I'll hear no more ! too long 
We gaze on danger through the mist of fear, 
And multiply upon our shattered hopes 
The images of ruin. Come what will ! 
To-morrow and to-morrow are as lamps 
Set in our path to light us to the edge, 
Through rough and smooth ; nor can we suffer aught 
Which He inflicts not, in whose hands we are." 

When the Jew, Ahasuerus, at length arrives, he speaks in 
oracular terms, and calls up visions which increase the 
Sultan's fears; and When the latter hears shouts of tran- 
sient victory over the Greeks, he regards it but as the 
expiring gleam which serves to make the coming dark- 
ness the more terrible. He thus soliloquizes : 



508 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

" Weak lightning before darkness ! poor faint smile 

Of dying Islam I Voice which art the response 

Of hollow weakness ! Do I wake, and live, 

Were there such things? or may the unquiet brain, 

Vexed by the wise mad talk of the old Jew, 

Have shaped itself these shadows of its fear ? 

It matters not ! for naught we see, or dream, 

Possess or lose, or grasp at, can be worth 

More than it gives or teaches. Come what may, 

The future must become the past, and I 

As they were, to whom once the present hour, 

This gloomy crag of time to which I cling, 

Seemed an Elysian isle of peace and joy 

Never to be attained." 

Although the poet predicts series of disasters and pe- 
riods of gloom for struggling Greece, yet, at the close of 
the poem, a brighter age than any she has known is rep- 
resented as gleaming upon her " through the sunset of 
hope." 

The year 1822 opened with the assembling of the first 
Greek congress at Epidau'rus, the proclaiming of a pro- 
visional constitution on the 13th of January, and the is- 
suing, on the 27th, of a declaration that announced the 
union of all Greece, with an independent federative gov- 
ernment under the presidency of Alexander Mavrocor- 
da/to. But the Greeks, unaccustomed to exercise the 
rights of freemen, were unable at once to establish a 
wise and firm government : they often quarrelled among 
themselves; and those who had exercised an indepen- 
dent authority under the government of the Turks were 
with difficulty induced to submit to the control of the 
central government. The few men of intelligence and 
liberal views among them had a difficult task to per- 
form ; but the wretchedly undisciplined state of the 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 509 

Turkish armies aided its successful accomplishment. 
The principal military events of the year were the terri- 
ble massacre of the inhabitants of the Island of Scio by 
the Turks in April ; the defeat of the latter in the Mo- 
rea, where more than twenty thousand of them were 
slain ; the successes of the Greek fire-ships, by which 
many Turkish vessels were destroyed ; and the surren- 
der to the Greeks of Nap'oli di Roma'nia, the ancient 
Nauplia, the port of Argos. By the destruction of the 
Island of Scio a paradise was changed into a scene of 
desolation, and more than forty thousand persons were 
killed or sold into slavery. Soon after, one hundred and 
fifty villages in southern Macedonia experienced the fate 
of Scio ; and the pasha of Salonika boasted that he had de- 
stroyed, in one day, fifteen hundred women and children. 
Goaded to desperation, rather than disheartened by 
their reverses and the remorseless cruelties of the Turks, 
the Greeks struggled bravely on, and during the year 
1823 the results of the contest were generally in their 
favor. They often proved themselves worthy sons of 
those who fell 

" In bleak Thermopylae's strait," 

or on the plains of Marathon. Their patriotic determi- 
nation to be free, or die in the attempt, is happily re- 
flected in the following lines by the poet Campbell, 
whose heart beat in sympathy with their efforts for lib- 
erty. 

Song of the Greeks. 

Again to the battle, Achaians ! 

Our hearts bid the tyrants defiance ! 

Our land — the first garden of Liberty's tree — 

It hath been, and shall yet be, the land of the free ; 

For the Cross of our faith is replanted, 

The pale, dying crescent is daunted, 



510 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

And we march that the footprints of Mahomet's slaves 
May be washed out in blood from our forefathers' graves. 
Their spirits are hovering o'er us, 
And the sword shall to glory restore us. 

Ah ! what though no succor advances, 

Nor Christendom's chivalrous lances 

Are stretched in our aid? Be the combat our own ! 

And we'll perish or conquer more proudly alone ! 

For we've sworn by our country's assaulters, 

By the virgins they've dragged from our altars, 

By our massacred patriots, our children in chains, 

By our heroes of old, and their blood in our veins, 

That, living, we shall be victorious, 

Or that, dying, our deaths shall be glorious! 

A breath of submission we breathe not : 

The sword that we've drawn we will sheathe not ; 

Its scabbard is left where our martyrs are laid, 

And the vengeance of ages has whetted its blade. 

Earth may hide, waves ingulf, fire consume us ; 

But they shall not to slavery doom us. 

If they rule, it shall be o'er our ashes and graves : 

But we've smote them already with fire on the waves, 

And new triumphs on land are before us — 

To the charge ! — Heaven's banner is o'er us. 

This day shall ye blush for its story, 

Or brighten your lives with its glory. 

Our women — oh say, shall they shriek in despair, 

Or embrace us from conquest, .with wreaths in their hair ? 

Accursed may his memory blacken, 

If a coward there be who would slacken 

Till we've trampled the turban, and shown ourselves worth 

Being sprung from, and named for, the godlike of earth. 

Strike home ! and the world shall revere us 

As heroes descended from heroes. 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 511 

Old Greece lightens up with emotion ! 

Her inlands, her isles of the ocean, 

Fanes rebuilt, and fair towns, shall with jubilee ring*, 

And the Nine shall new hallow their Helicon's spring. 

Our hearths shall be kindled in gladness, 

That were cold and extinguished in sadness ; 

While our maidens shall dance, with their white waving arms, 

Singing joy to the brave that delivered their charms, 

When the blood of yon Mussulman cravens 

Shall have crimsoned the beaks of our ravens ! 

AMERICAN SYMPATHY WITH GREECE. 

The progress of events in 1822 and 1823 made friends 
for the Greeks wherever free principles were cherished ; 
and from England and America large contributions of 
money, clothing, and provisions, were forwarded to re- 
lieve the sufferings inflicted by the wanton cruelties of 
the Turks. It was the United States, however, as the 
first American Minister to Greece, Mr. Tuckekman, says, 
that first responded, " in the words of President Monroe, 
Webster, Clay, Everett, D wight, and hosts of other 
lights,' 5 to the appeal of the Greek senate at Kalamata, 
made in 1821. When Congress assembled in December, 
1823, President Monroe made the revolution in Greece 
the subject of a paragraph in his annual message, in 
which he expressed the hope of success to the Greeks 
and disaster to the Turks ; and Mr. Webster subse- 
quently introduced a resolution in the House of Repre- 
sentatives providing for the appointment of an agent or 
commissioner to Greece. These were the first official 
expressions favorable to the struggling country uttered 
by any government; and in speaking to his resolution 
in January, 1824, Mr. Webster began his remarks as fol- 
lows : 

"An occasion which calls the attention to a spot so 



J 



512 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

distinguished, so connected with interesting recollec- 
tions, as Greece, may naturally create something of 
warmth and enthusiasm. In a grave political discussion, 
however, it is necessary that those feelings should be 
chastened. I shall endeavor properly to repress them, 
although it is impossible that they should be altogether 
extinguished. We must, indeed, fly beyond the civilized 
world ; we must pass the dominion of law and the boun- 
daries of knowledge; we must, more especially, with- 
draw ourselves from this place, and the scenes and ob- 
jects which here surround us, if we would separate our- 
selves entirely from the influence of all those memorials 
of herself which ancient Greece has transmitted for the 
admiration and the benefit of mankind. This free form 
of government, this popular assembly — the common coun- 
cil for the common good — where have we contemplated 
its earliest models? This practice of free debate and 
public discussion, the contest of mind with mind, and 
that popular eloquence which, if it were now here, on a 
subject like this, would move the stones of the Capitol 
— whose was the language in which all these were first 
exhibited ? Even the edifice in which we assemble, these 
proportioned columns, this ornamented architecture, all 
remind us that Greece has existed, and that we, like the 
rest of mankind,' are greatly her debtors. 

"But I have not introduced this motion in the vain 
hope of discharging anything of this accumulated debt 
of centuries. I have not acted upon the expectation 
that we who have inherited this obligation from our 
ancestors should now attempt to pay it to those who 
may seem to have inherited from their ancestors a right 
to receive payment. My object is nearer and more im- 
mediate. I wish to take occasion of the struggle of an 
interesting and gallant people in the cause of liberty 
and Christianity, to draw the attention of the House to 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 513 

the circumstances which have accompanied that strug- 
gle, and to the principles which appear to have gov- 
erned the conduct of the great states of Europe in 
regard to it, and to the effects and consequences of 
these principles upon the independence of nations, and 
especially upon the institutions of free governments. 
"What I have to say of Greece, therefore, concerns the 
modern, not the ancient — the living, and not the dead. 
It regards her, not as she exists in history, triumphant 
over time, and tyranny, and ignorance, but as she now 
is, contending against fearful odds for being, and for 
the common privileges of human nature." 

In an argument of some length Mr. Webster forci- 
bly condemns the then existing policy of the European 
Powers, who, holding that all changes in legislation and 
administration " ought to proceed from kings alone," 
were therefore " wholly inexorable to the sufferings of 
the Greeks, and entirely hostile to their success." He 
demands that the protest of this government shall be 
made against this policy, both as it is laid down in prin- 
ciple and as it is applied in practice ; and he closes his 
address with the following references to the determi- 
nation of the Greeks and the sympathy their struggle 
should receive: 

" Constantinople and the northern provinces have 
sent forth thousands of troops; they have been defeat- 
ed. Tripoli, and Algiers, and Egypt have contributed 
their marine contingents; they have not kept the ocean. 
Hordes of Tartars have crossed the Bosphorus ; they 
have died where the Persians died. The powerful mon- 
archies in the neighborhood have denounced the Greek 
cause, and admonished the Greeks to abandon it and 
submit to their fate. They have answered that, although 
two hundred thousand of their countrymen have offered 
up their lives, there yet remain lives to offer ; and that 

22* 






514 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

it is the determination of all — ' yes, of all ' — to perse- 
vere until they shall have established their liberty, or 
until the power of their oppressors shall have relieved 
them from the burden of existence. It may now be 
asked, perhaps, whether the expression of our own sym- 
pathy, and that of the country, may do them good? I 
hope it may. It may give them courage and spirit; it 
may assure them of public regard, teach them that they 
are not wholly forgotten by the civilized world, and in- 
spire them with constancy in the pursuit of their great 
end. At any rate, it appears to me that the measure 
which I have proposed is due to our own character, and 
called for by our own duty. When we have discharged 
that duty we may leave the rest to the disposition of 
Providence. * * * I am not of those who would, in the 
hour of utmost peril, withhold such encouragement as 
might be properly and lawfully given, and, when the 
crisis should be past, overwhelm the rescued sufferer 
with kindness and caresses. The Greeks address the 
civilized world with a pathos not easy to be resisted. 
They invoke our favor by more moving considerations 
than can well belong to the condition of any other peo- 
ple. They stretch out their arms to the Christian com- 
munities of the earth, beseeching them, by a generous 
recollection of their ancestors, by the consideration of 
their desolated and ruined cities and villages, by their 
wives and children sold into an accursed slavery, by 
their blood, which they seem willing to pour out like 
water, by the common faith and in the name which 
unites all Christians, that they would extend to them at 
least some token of compassionate regard." 

THE SORTIE AT MISSOLONGHL 

One of the noted exploits of the Greeks in 1823, and 
one that has been commemorated in many ways, occur- 



GEEECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE KOMAN CONQUEST. 515 

red at Missolon'ghi, the capital of Acarnania and JEto- 
lia, while that town was besieged by a Turkish army; 
and the name of Marco Boz-zar'is, the commander of 
the garrison, has ever since been classed with that of 
Leonidas and other heroes of ancient Greece who fell in 
the moment of victory. In his Crescent and the Cross / 
or, Romance and Realities of Eastern Travel, the Eng- 
lish author Waeburton thus tells the story of the well- 
known deed that saved Missolonghi to the Greeks and 
hastened the delivery of their country : 

"When Missolonghi was beleaguered by the Turkish 
forces, Marco Bozzaris commanded a garrison of about 
twelve hundred men, who had barely fortifications 
enough to form breastworks. Intelligence reached him 
that an Egyptian army was about to form a junction 
with the formidable besieging host. A parade was or- 
dered of the garrison, 'faint and few, but fearless still.' 
Bozzaris told them of the destruction that impended 
over Missolonghi, proposed a sortie, and announced that 
it should consist only of volunteers. Volunteers ! The 
whole garrison stepped forward as one man, and de- 
manded the post of honor and of death. 'I will only 
take the Thermopylse number,' said their leader; and he 
selected the three hundred from his true and trusty Su- 
liotes. In the dead of night this devoted band marched 
out in six divisions, which were placed, in profound si- 
lence, around the Turkish camp. Their orders were 
simply, ' When you hear my bugle blow seek me in the 
pasha's tent.' 

"Marco Bozzaris, disguised as an Albanian bearing 
despatches to the pasha from the Egyptian army, passed 
unquestioned through the Turkish camp, and was only 
arrested by the sentinels around the pasha's tent, who 
informed him that he must wait till morning. Then 
wildly through the stillness of the night that bugle 



516 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

blew ; faithfully it was echoed from without ; and Jhe 
war-cry of the avenging Greek broke upon the Mos- 
lem's ear. From every side that terrible storm seemed 
to break at once; shrieks of agony and terror swelled 
the tumult. The Turks fled in all directions, and the 
Grecian leader was soon surrounded by his comrades. 
Struck to the ground by a musket-ball, he had himself 
raised on the shoulders of two Greeks ; and, thus sup- 
ported, he pressed on the flying enemy. Another bullet 
pierced his brain in the hour of his triumph, and he was 
borne dead from the field of his glory." But Missolon- 
ghi was saved, and under Constantine and ISToto Boz- 
zaris, brothers of the dead hero, it withstood repeated as- 
saults of the Turks, until, in 1826, after having been be- 
sieged for over a year by a very large naval and military 
force, it was finally taken. Those left of the small gar- 
rison who were able to fight, placing the women in the 
centre, sallied forth at midnight of the 22d of April, 
and cut their way through the Turkish camp ; while those 
who were too feeble to attempt an escape assembled in a 
large mill that was used*as a powder-magazine, and blew 
themselves and many of the incoming Turks to atoms. 

Some fifteen years after the death of Marco Bozzaris, 
the American traveller and author, Mr. John L. Ste- 
phens, visited Greece, and, at Missolonghi, was presented 
to Constantine Bozzaris and the widow and children of 
his deceased brother. In the account which the author 
gives of this interview, in his Incidents of Travel in 
Greece, he describes Constantine Bozzaris, then a colonel 
in the service of King Otho, as a man of about fifty 
years of age, of middle height and spare build, who, im- 
mediately after the formal introduction, expressed his 
gratitude as a Greek for the services rendered his coun- 
try by America ; and added, " with sparkling eye and 
flushed cheek, that when the Greek revolutionary flag 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 517 

sailed into the port of Napoli di Romania, among hun- 
dreds of vessels of all nations, an American captain was 
the first to recognize and salute it." Mr. Stephens thus 
describes the widow of the Greek hero : " She was under 
forty, tall and stately in person, and habited in deep 
black. She looked the widow of a hero ; as one worthy 
of those Grecian mothers who gave their hair for bow- 
strings and their girdles for sword-belts, and, while their 
heartstrings were cracking, sent their husbands to fight 
and perish for their country. Perhaps it was she who led 
Marco Bozzaris from the wild guerilla warfare in which 
he had passed his early life, and fired him with the high 
and holy ambition of freeing his country. I am certain 
that no man could look her in the face without finding 
his wavering purposes fixed, and without treading more 
firmly in the path of high and honorable ambition." 

Mr. Stephens closes the account of his interview with 
the widow and family as follows : " At parting I told 
them that the name of Marco Bozzaris was as familiar 
in America as that of a hero of our own Revolution, 
and that it had been hallowed by the inspiration of an 
American poet. I added that, if it would not be unac- 
ceptable, on my return to my native country I would 
send the tribute referred to, as an evidence of the feel- 
ing existing in America toward the memory of Marco 
Bozzaris." The promised tribute was the following 
beautiful and stirring poem by Fitz-Gkeene Halleck : 

Marco Bozzaris. 

At midnight, in his guarded tent, 
The Turk was dreaming of the hour 

When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent, 
Should tremble at his power : 

In dreams, through camp and court, he bore 

The trophies of a conqueror ; 



518 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

In dreams his song of triumph heard ; 
Then wore his monarch's signet-ring; 
Then pressed that monarch's throne — a king; 
As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing, 

As Eden's garden-bird. 

At midnight, in the forest shades, 

Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band, 
True as the steel of their tried blades, 

Heroes in heart and hand. 
There had the Persian's thousands stood, 
There had the glad earth drunk their blood 

On old Platsea's da) T ; 
And now there breathed that haunted air 
The sons of sires who conquered there, 
With arm to strike, and soul to dare, 

As quick, as far as they. 

An hour passed on — the Turk awoke ; 

That bright dream was his last ; 
He woke to hear his sentries shriek 
"To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!" 
He woke, to die 'mid flame and smoke } 
And shout, and groan, and sabre-stroke, 

And death-shots falling thick and fast 
As lio-htning-s from the mountain-cloud, 
And heard, with voice as trumpet loud, 

Bozzaris cheer his band : 
" Strike ! till the last armed foe expires ; 
Strike ! for your altars and your fires ; 
Strike ! for the green graves of your sires, 

God, and your native land !" 

They fought like brave men, long and well ; 

They piled that ground with Moslem slain ; 
They conquered ; but Bozzaris fell, 

Bleeding at every vein. 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 519 

His few surviving comrades saw 

His smile when rang their proud hurrah, 

And the red field was won, 
Then saw in death his eyelids close, 
Calmly as to a night's repose — 

Like flowers at set of sun. 

Come to the bridal chamber, Death ! 

Come to the mother, when she feels, 
For the first time, her first-born's breath ; 

Come when the blessed seals 
That close the pestilence are broke, 
And crowded cities wail its stroke ; 
Come in consumption's ghastly form, 
The earthquake shock, the ocean storm ; 
Come when the heart beats high and warm 

With banquet song, and dance, and wine ; 
And thou art terrible : the tear, 
The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier, 
And all we know, or dream, or fear 

Of agony, are thine. 

But to the hero, when his sword 

Has won the battle for the free, 
Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word, 
And in its hollow tones are heard 

The thanks of millions yet to be. 
Come, when his task of fame is wrought ; 
Come, with her laurel-leaf, blood-bought; 

Come, in her crowning hour — and then 
Thy sunken eye's unearthly light 
To him is welcome as the sight 

Of sky and stars to prisoned men ; 
Thy grasp is welcome as the hand 
Of brother in a foreign land ; 
Thy summons welcome as the crv 
That told the Indian isles were nio-h 



520 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

To the world-seeking Genoese, 
"When the land-wind, from woods of palm, 
And orange-groves, and fields of balm, 

Blew o'er the Haytien seas. 

Bozzaris ! with the storied brave 

Greece nurtured in her glory's time, 
Rest thee — there is no prouder grave, 

Even in her own proud clime. 
She wore no funeral weeds for thee, 

Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume, 
Like torn branch from death's leafless tree, 
In sorrow's pomp and pageantry, 

The heartless luxury of the tomb ; 
But she remembers thee as one 
Long loved, and for a season gone : 
For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed, 
Her marble wrought, her music breathed ; 
For thee she rings the birthday bells ; 
Of thee her babes' first lisping tells ; 
For thine her evening prayer is said 
At palace couch and cottage bed ; 
Her soldier, closing with the foe, 
Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow ; 
His plighted maiden, when she fears 
For him, the joy of her young years, 
Thinks of thy fate and checks her tears . 

And she, the mother of thy boys, 
Though in her eye and faded cheek 
Is read the grief she will not speak, 
The memory of her buried joys, 
And even she who gave thee birth, 
Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth, 
Talk of thy doom without a sigh : 
For thou art Freedom's now, and Fame's — 
One of the few, the immortal names 
That were not born to die ! 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 521 

About the time of the exploit of Bozzaris, Lord Byron 
arrived in Greece, to take an active part in aid of Greek 
independence, and proceeded to Missolonghi in January, 
1824. No warmer friend of the Greeks than Byron ever 
lived ; but while he sympathized with, and was anxious 
to aid in every way possible, those who, in his own words, 
" suffered all the moral and physical ills that could afflict 
humanity," it was evidently his honest belief that the only 
salvation for Greece lay in her becoming a British de- 
pendency. In his notes to Chilcle Harold, penned before 
the revolution broke out, but while all Greece was ablaze 
with the desire for liberty, he wrote as follows : " The 
Greeks will never be independent ; they will never be sov- 
ereigns, as heretofore, and God forbid they ever should ! 
but they may be subjects without being slaves. Our col- 
onies are not independent, but they are free and industri- 
ous, and such may Greece be hereafter." These words 
show that he considered Greece incapable of self-govern- 
ment, should she ever regain her liberty ; and he there- 
fore deprecated a return to her ancient sovereignty. That 
this was his view, and that he subsequently designed to 
give it effect in his own person, we are assured from the 
well-founded belief, derived from his own declarations, 
that when he joined the Greek cause he had a mind to 
place himself at its head, hoping and perhaps believing 
that he might become King of Hellas, under the protec- 
tion of Great Britain. But whatever his plans may have 
been, they were cut short by his death, at Missolonghi, 
on the 19th of April following his arrival there. 

INTERFERENCE OF THE GREAT POWERS. 

In the campaign of 1824, while the Greeks, lost Can- 
dia and the strongly fortified rocky isle of Ip'sara, a 
Turkish fleet was repulsed off Samos, and a large Egyp- 
tian fleet, sent to attack the Morea, was frustrated in all 



522 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

its designs. The campaign of 1825, however, was opened 
by the landing, in the Morea, of a large Egyptian army, 
under Ibrahim Pasha, son of the Viceroy of Egypt. 
Navari'no soon fell into his power; and at the time of 
the fall of Missolonghi, in the following year, he was in 
possession of most of southern Greece, and many of the 
islands of the Archipelago. The foundation of an Egyp- 
tian military and slave-holding state now seemed to be 
laid in Europe; and this danger, combined with the no- 
ble defence and sufferings at Missolonghi and elsewhere, 
attracted the serious attention of the European govern- 
ments and people ; numerous philanthropic societies were 
formed to aid the Greeks, and finally three of the great 
European powers were moved to interfere in their be- 
half. On the 6th of July, 1827, a treaty was concluded 
at London between England, Russia, and France, stipu- 
lating that the Greeks should govern themselves, but 
that they should pay tribute to the Porte. 

To enforce this treaty a combined English, French, 
and Russian squadron sailed to the Grecian Archipela- 
go; but the Turkish Sultan haughtily rejected the in- 
tervention of the three powers, and the troops of Ibra- 
him Pasha continued their devastations in the Morea. 
On the 20th of October the allied squadron, under the 
command of the English admiral, Edward Codrington, 
entered the harbor of Navarino, where the Turkish- 
Egyptian fleet lay at anchor; and a sanguinary naval 
battle followed, in which the allies nearly destroyed the 
fleet of the enemy. Although this action was spoken 
of by the British government as an " untoward event," 
Admiral Codrington was rewarded both by England and 
Russia ; and the poet Campbell, in the following lines 
on the battle, naturally praises him for planning and 
striking this decisive blow for Grecian liberty: 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 523 

The Battle of JVavarmo. 

Hearts of Oak, that Lave bravely delivered the brave, 
And uplifted old Greece from the brink of the grave ! 
'Twas the helpless to help, and the hopeless to save, 

That your thunderbolts swept o'er the brine ; 
And as long as yon sun shall look down on the wave 

The light of your glory shall shine. 

For the guerdon ye sought with your bloodshed and toil, 
Was it slaves, or dominion, or rapine, or spoil ? 
No ! your lofty emprise was to fetter and foil 

The uprooter of Greece's domain, 
When he tore the last remnant of food from her soil, 

Till her famished sank pale as the slain ! 

Yet, Navar'i'no's heroes ! does Christendom breed 

The base hearts that will question the fame of your deed? 

Are they men ? — let ineffable scorn be their meed, 

And oblivion shadow their craves ! 
Are they women ?— to Turkish serails let them speed, 

And be mothers of Mussulmen slaves ! 

Abettors of massacre ! dare ye deplore 

That the death-shriek is silenced on Hellas's shore ? 

That the mother aghast sees her offspring no more 

By the hand of Infanticide grasped ? 
And that stretched on yon billows distained by their gore 

Missolonghi's assassins have gasped ? 

Prouder scene never hallowed war's pomp to the mind 
Than when Christendom's pennons wooed social the wind, 
And the flower of her brave for the combat combined — 

Their watchword, humanitv's vow : 
Not a sea-boy that fought in that cause but mankind 

Owes a garland to honor his brow ! 



524 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

No grudge, by our side, that to conquer or fall 

Came the hardy, rude Rnss, and the high-mettled Gaul : 

For whose was the genius that planned, at its call, 

When the whirlwind of battle should roll ? 
All were brave ! but the star of success over all 

Was the light of our Codrington's soul. 

That star of thy day-spring, regenerate Greek ! 

Dimmed the Saracen's moon, and struck pallid his cheek: 

In its fast flushing morning thy Muses shall speak, 

When their love and their lutes they reclaim ; 
And the first of their songs from Parnassus's peak 

Shall be " Glory to Codrington's name !" 

The result of the conflict at Navarino so enraged the 
Turks that they stopped all communication with the 
allied powers, and prepared for war. In the following 
year (1828) France and England sent an army to the 
Morea: Eussia declared war for violations of treaties, 
and depredations upon her commerce ; and on the 7th 
of May a Enssian army of one hundred and fifteen thou- 
sand men, under Count Wittgenstein, crossed the Pruth, 
and by the 2d of July had taken seven fortresses from 
the Turks. In August a convention was concluded with 
Ibrahim Pasha, who agreed to evacuate the Morea, and 
set his Greek prisoners at liberty. In the mean time 
the Greeks continued the war, drove the Turks from 
the country north of the Corinthian Gulf, and fitted out 
numerous privateers to prey upon the commerce of their 
enemy. In January, 1829, the Sultan received a pro- 
tocol'from the three allied powers, declaring that they 
took the Morea and the Cyc'lades under their protection, 
and that the entry of any military force into Greece 
would be regarded as an attack upon themselves. The 
danger of open war with France and England, as well 
as the successes and alarming advances of the Kussians, 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 525 

now commanded by Marshal Die'bitsch, who had mean- 
time taken Adrianople, within one hundred and thirty 
miles of the Turkish capital, induced the Sultan to listen 
to overtures of peace; and on the 14th of September 
"the peace of Adrianople" was signed by Turkey and I 
Kussia, by which the former recognized the indepen- 
dence of Greece. 



VI. GREECE UNDER A CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCHY. 

Though freed from her Turkish oppressors, Greece 
was severely agitated by domestic discontents, jealousies, 
and even manifest turbulence. Count Ca'po d'Is'tria, a 
Greek in the service of Russia, who had been chosen, in 
1828, president of the provisional government, aroused 
suspicions that he designed to establish a despotism in 
his own person, and he was assassinated in 1831. A pe- 
riod of anarchy followed. The great powers had pre- 
viously determined to erect Greece into a monarchy, 
and had first offered the crown to Prince Leopold, after- 
ward King of Belgium, who, having accepted the offer, 
soon after declined it on account of the unwillingness of 
the Greeks to receive him, and their dissatisfaction with 
the territorial boundaries prescribed for them. Finally, 
the boundaries of the kingdom having been more satis- 
factorily determined by a treaty between Turkey and 
the powers in 1S32, the crown was conferred on Otlio, a 
Bavarian prince, who arrived at Nauplia, the then capi- 
tal of Greece, in 1833. Athens became the seat of gov- 
ernment in 1835. Says a writer in the British Quar- 
terly, " The Greeks neither elected their own sovereign 
nor chose their national polity. In a spirit of generous 
confidence they allowed the three protecting powers to 
name a king for them, and the powers rewarded them 
by making the worst selection they could. They gave 



V 



526 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

the Greeks a boy of seventeen, with neither a character 
to form nor an intellect to develop." 

The treaty by which Otho was placed on the throne 
made no provision for a constitution, but one was ex- 
pected ; and, after ten years of oppressive subjection by 
the king and his Bavarian minions, both the people and 
a revolted soldiery surrounded the palace, and demanded 
a constitution. The king acquiesced, a national assem- 
bly was held, and a constitution was framed which re- 
| ceived the king's approval in March, 1844. In this 
bloodless revolution we have an instance both of the 
determination, and peaceable, orderly, and well-disposed 
tendencies of the Greek people. An eye-witness of the 
scene has thus described it : 

"I well recollect the uprising of 1843. Exasperated 
by the miserable rule of Otho, a plot was hatched to 
wrench a constitution from him, and when everything 
was ripe the Athenians arose. At midnight the hoofs 
of horses were heard clanging on the pavements, and 
the flash of torches gleamed in the streets, as the popu- 
lace and military hurried toward the palace ; and when 
the amber-colored dawn lighted the Acropolis and the 
plain of Athens, the king found himself surrounded by 
his happy subjects, and discovered two field-pieces point- 
ing into the entrance of the royal residence. A consti- 
tution was demanded in firm but respectful terms — it 
being suggested at the same time that, if the request 
were not granted by four o'clock in the afternoon, fire 
would be opened on the palace. In the mean while all 
Athens was gathered in the. open space around the pal- 
ace, chatting, cracking jokes, taking snuff, and smoking, 
as if they had assembled to witness a show or hear the 
reading of a will. Not a shot was fired ; no violence 
was offered or received ; and precisely as the limiting 
hour arrived, the obstinate king succumbed to his be- 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 527 

siegers, and the multitude quietly dispersed to their 
homes." ' 

The Constitution which the Greeks secured contained 
no real guarantee for the legislative rights of the people, 
and the minor benefits it gave them were ignored by 
the government. A continuance of the severe contests 
between the national party and foreign intriguers ma- 
terially interfered with the prosperity of the^country. 
Other events, also, now occurred to disturb it. In 1847 
a diplomatic difficulty with Turkey, and, in 1848, a dif- 
ference with England, that 'arose from various claims of 
English subjects, and that continued for several years, 
assumed threatening proportions, and were only termi- 
nated by the submission of Greece to the demands made 
upon her. When the Crimean war broke out, Greece 
took a decided stand in favor of Kussia; but England 
and France soon compelled her to assume and maintain 
a strictly neutral position. In 1859 the residents of the 
Ionian Islands, which were under the protectorate of 
England, sought annexation to Greece, and manifested 
their intentions in great popular demonstrations, and 
even insurrections; but Greece, though sympathizing 
with them, was too feeble to aid them, and no change 
was then made in their relations. 

THE DEPOSITION OF KING OTHO. 

While these events were transpiring, the feeling of 
hostility toward King Otho and the royal family was 
taking deeper root with the Greek people, and open 
demonstrations of violence were frequently made. The 
king promised more liberal measures of government; but 
these fell short of the popular demand, and the Greeks 
resolved to dethrone the dynasty. In October, 1862, 

1 S. G. W. Benjamin, in. " The Turk and the Greek." 



528 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

after several violent demonstrations elsewhere, matters 
culminated in a successful revolution at Athens. A pro- 
visional government was established by the leaders of 
the popular party, who decreed the deposition of the 
kino-. Otho, who was absent from Athens at the time, 
on a visit to ISTapoli, finding himself without a throne 
did not return to Athens, but issued a proclamation tak- 
ing leave of Greece, and sailed for Germany in an Eng- 
lish frigate. He had occupied the throne just thirty 
years. Me. Tuckerman thus describes him : " An honest- 
hearted man, but without intellectual strength, dressed 
in the Greek f ustinella, he endeavored to be Greek in 
spirit ; but under his braided jacket his heart beat to for- 
eign measures, and his ear inclined to foreign counsels. 
But for the quicker-witted Amelia, the queen, his follies 
would have worn out the patience of the people sooner 
than they did." The condition of Greece under his gov- 
ernment is thus described by the writer in the British 
Quarterly, who wrote immediately after the coup d'etat: 
' " To outward appearance, the Greece which the Phil- 
hel'lenists of the days of Canning declared to be re-ani- 
mated and restored, has presented, during thirty years 
of settled government, the aspect of a country corrupt, 
intriguing, venal, and poor. The government has kept 
faith neither with its subjects nor with its creditors ; it 
has endeavored, by all means in its power, to crush the 
constitutional liberties of its subjects ; and by refusing, 
throughout this period, to pay a single drachma of its 
public debt, it has stamped itself either hopelessly bank- 
rupt or scandalously fraudulent, The people, meanwhile, 
crushed by the incubus of a dishonest and extravagant 
foreign rule, remain in nearly the situation they held 
on the first establishment of their kingdom. In a word, 
Greece was thirty years ago transferred from one des- 
potism to another. The Bavarian rule was no apprecia- 



GKEECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE KOMAN CONQUEST. 529 

ble mitigation of the Turkish rule. If the Christian 
monarch hated his Hellenic subjects less than the Mus- 
sulman monarch, he was still more ignorant of the con- 
ditions of prosperous government." 

THE ACCESSWX OF KING GEORGE. 

If it has ever had an existence, Greek independence 
may be properly dated from the deposition of the Bava- 
rian dynasty. In December, 1862, a committee appoint- 
ed by the provisional government ordered the election 
of a new king. The national assembly shortly after 
met at Athens, and, having first confirmed the deposi- 
tion of Otho, of those proposed as candidates for the 
vacant throne by the European powers, Prince Alfred 
of England was elected by an immense majority on the 
first ballot. This choice of a scion of the freest and 
most stable of the constitutional monarchies of Europe, 
was an expression of the desire and the resolve of the 
Greek people to secure as full political and civil liberties 
as was possible for them under a monarchical govern- 
ment. But Prince Alfred was held ineligible inconse- 
quence of a clause in the protocol of the protecting 
powers, which declared that the government of Greece 
should not be confided to a prince chosen from the 
reigning families of those states. Thereupon, in March, 
1863, Prince George of Denmark, the present king, was \ 
unanimously elected by the assembly, and his election 
was confirmed by the great powers in the following July. 
There is every reason to suppose that England assumed 
the honor of choosing Prince George. On the with- 
drawal of Prince Alfred she expressed her willingness 
to abandon her protectorate of the Ionian Islands^ and 
cede them to Greece, provided a king were chosen to 
whom the English government could not object. The 
Ionian Islands were ceded to Greece within two months 

23 



530 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTOKY. 

after the accession of King George; and Mr. Tuckerman 
relates that, " when Prince Christian, King of Denmark, 
was in London, attending the marriage of his daughter 
to the Prince of Wales, Lord John Russell discovered 
the second son of Prince Christian in the uniform of a 
midshipman, and suggested his name as the successor of 
Otho." 

King George took the constitutional oath in October, 
1863. In 1866 the revolution in Crete, or Candia, 
broke out, and, owing to Greek sympathy with the in- 
surrectionists, thousands of whom found an asylum in 
Greece, grave complications arose between Greece and 
Turkey, which were only settled by a conference of the 
great powers in 1869. By the treaty with the Porte in 
1832 the boundary line of Greece had been settled in 
an arbitrary manner, by running it from the Gulf of 
Volo along the chain of the Othrys Mountains to the 
Gulf of Arta — by which Greece was deprived of the 
high fertile plains of Thessaly and Epirus, the largest 
and richest of classical Greece. At the close of the late 
Russian-Turkish war, however, the boundary line was 
changed by the powers so as to include within the king- 
dom a large portion of those ancient possessions; but 
this change occasioned serious conflicts between the 
government and the people of the annexed districts, 
and difficulties also arose with Turkey in consequence. 
But these were finally settled by an amendment to the 
treaty, passed in 1881. 

With the exceptions just noted, no important events 
have disturbed the peace of Greece since the accession 
of King George. In him the country has a ruler of 
capacity, who is in great measure his own adviser, and 
who comprehends the chief wish of his subjects, "that 
Greece shall govern Greece." As Mr. Tuckerman has 
said of him, " Unlike his predecessor, he is a Greek by 



GREECE SUBSEQUENT TO THE ROMAN CONQUEST. 531 

sympathy of language and ideas. He feels the popular 
pulse and tries to keep time with it, not more as a mat- 
ter of policy than from national sympathy; and his 
hands are comparatively free of the impediment of those 
foreign ministerial counsellors who, each struggling for 
supremacy, united only in checking the political ad- 
vancement of the kingdom." It was no fault of the 
Greek people that, under King Otho, Greece failed to 
make the internal advancement that was expected of 
her on her escape from Moslem tyrann} 7 . It was the 
fault of the government; for, when a better govern- 
ment came, there was a corresponding change in the 
inner life of the people; and at the present time, with 
the freest of constitutional monarchies, and under the 
guidance of a ruler so sympathetic, competent, and pop- 
ular, redeemed Greece is making rapid strides in intel- 
lectual and material progress. Of this progress we have 
the following account by a prominent American divine, 
a recent visitor to that country : 

Progress in Modern Greece} 

"You lean over the parapet of the Acropolis, on the 
side toward the modern city, and look in vain for the 
print of that Yenetian leprous scandal and that Turkish 
hoof which for six hundred years trod Greece into the 
slime. In the long bondage to the barbarian, the Hel- 
lenic spirit was weakened, but not broken. The Greek, 
with his fine texture, loathes the stolid, opaque temper- 
ament of the polygamistic Turk. Intermarriages be- 
tween the races are very few. The Greek race is not 
extinct. In many rural populations in Greece the mod- 
ern Hellenic blood is as pure as the ancient. Only 
Hellenic blood explains Hellenic countenances, yet easi- 

1 Rev. Joseph Cook, in the New York Independent, Fehruary, 1883. 



532 MOSAICS OF GRECIAN HISTORY. 

ly found ; the Hellenic language, yet wonderfully in- 
corrupt; and the Hellenic spirit, omnipresent in lib- 
erated Greece. Fifty years ago not a book could be 
bought at Athens. To-day one in eighteen of the whole 
population of Greece is in school. In 1881 thirteen very 
tall factory chimney-stacks could be counted in the 
Pirse'us, not one of which was there in 1873. It is pa- 
thetic to find Greece at last opening, on the Acropolis 
and in the heart of Athens, national museums for the 
sacred remnants of her own ancient art, which have been 
pillaged hitherto for the enrichment of the museums of 
all AVestern Europe. * '* ■* During sixty years of indepen- 
dence the Hellenic spirit has doubled the population of 
Greece, increased her revenues five hundred per cent., 
extended telegraphic communication over the kingdom, 
enlarged the fleet from four hundred and forty to Hve 
thousand vessels, opened eight ports, founded eleven 
new cities, restored forty ruined towns, changed Ath- 
ens from a hamlet of hovels to a city of seventy thou- 
sand inhabitants, and planted there a royal palace, a 
legislative chamber, ten type-founderies, forty printing 
establishments, twenty newspapers, an astronomical ob- 
servatory, and a university with eighty professors and 
fifteen hundred students. * * * After little more than half 
a centuiy of independence, the Hellenic spirit devotes 
a larger percentage of public revenue to purposes of 
instruction than France, Italy, England, Germany, or 
even the United States. Modern Greece, sixty years 
ago a slave and a beggar, to-day, by the confession of 
the most merciless statisticians, stands at the head of the 
list of self-educated nations." 



INDEX. 



[Names in CAPITALS denote authors to whom prominent reference is made, or from whom selections are 

taken.] 



Aby'dos. Xerxes aud his army at, 233. 

Acade'mia, or Ac-a-deme'. A public garden or grove, the resort of the phi- 
losophers at Athens, 457, 459, 462. 

Acarna'ni-a, 1 ; description of, 5 ; aids Athens, 270 ; 406, 515. 

A«hse'ans, the, 12; origin of, 70; 442, 443. 

Acliae'an League, the, 12, 441, 442. 

Aclise'us, son of Xuthus, and ancestor of the Achaeans, 70. 

Acba'ia, 2 ; description of, 11 ; 127, 276, 383, 406, 442, 501. Name given to Greece 
by the Romans, 446, 509. 

A-ehelo'us, the river, described, 5. 

A-eli'eron, the river, 3; described, 4; 356. 

A-eberu'sia (she-a), the lake, described, 4 ; 357. 

A-eliil'les, 00; accompanies expedition to Troy, S7; contends with Agamemnon, 
and withdraws, SS, 91; refuses to enter the contest, puts his armor on Patroclus, 
and the armor is lost, 95; description of his new armor, 96; he enters the fight, 
9S; encounters iEueas, who escapes; kills Hector, 99; delivers the body to 
Priam, 102 ; death of, 111 ; 123, ISO, 469, 4S5. 

Acri'si-us (she-us), King of Argos, 300, 301. 

Acrop'olis, the Athenian, 71; seizure of, by Cylon, 171 ; 175; by Pisistratus, 177; 
by the Persians, 243; famons structures of, 272; 302; its splendors in the time 
of Pericles, 30S-371; 4S3; injury to, inflicted by the Venetians, 4S6; 502, 520, 
531, 532. 

Actse'on, the fable of, S. 

Adme'tus, King of Pherre, 323. 

iEge'an Sea, 1, 10, 122, 127, 1S2, 264. 

JEgj'na, island of, 15; war of, with Athens, 232, 236; 275. 

^1 gos-pot'ami. Defeat of Athenians at, 294, 296. 

^Emo'nia, same as Haemonia, an early name of Thessaly, 251. 

^ne'as, a Trojan hero, aud subject of Virgil's JEne'id, 17, SS; wounded, and put 
to flight by Diomed, 90; fights for the body of Patroclus, 95; encounters Achil- 
les, aud is preserved by Neptune, 99 ; account of his escape from Troy, 104; 1S3. 

sKne'id, the, 17, 60, 104, 112, 209, 471. 

JEo'lians, the, 76; colonies of, 126, 127; 1S2, 199, 29S. 

^E'olus, progenitor of the ^Eolians, 75. 

^ES'€HI-NES, the orator, 230,. 404, 406, 407; prosecutes Demosthenes, 421 ; exile of, 
434 ; oratory of, 453. Extracts from : The Death of Darius, 412; Oration against 
Ctesiphon, 421-427. 

^ES'C'HYLUS, poet and tragedian, 300, 307. Life and works of, 309-313; 319, 321, 
323, 325, 33S, 3S5, 44S, 503. Extracts from: Punishment of Prometheus, 45-47; 
Retributive justice of the gods, 5G ; The taking of an oath, 59; The name 
"Helen," 87; Beacon fires from Troy to Argos, 10S; Battle of Salamis, 245-250; 
Murder of Agamemnon, 312. 



534 INDEX. 

iEscula'pius, god of the healing art. Shrine of, 143. 

iE'son, King of Iolcus, 81. 

JEt'na, a city in Sicily, founded by Hiero, 384. 

JEto'lia, 1, 5, 442, 443, 445, 515. 

.A game m noii, King of Mycenae, 13, 75 ; commands the expedition against Troy, 

86; contends with Achilles, SS ; demands restoration of Helen, 90, 91; returns 

to Greece and is murdered, 111; 13S, 311, 312. 
Agamemnon, the. Extracts from, 10S, 311. 
Aganip'pe, fountain of, S. 
Ag'athon, a tragedian, 448. 
Agesan'dros, a Rhodian sculptor, 471. 

Agesila'us, King of Sparta. Defeats the Persians at Sardis, 379. 
A'gis, King of Sparta, 379. 
Agrigen'tum, in Sicily, 184, 1S6. 
A'jax. Goes with the Greeks to Troy, 87; 91, 94 ; fights for the body of Patroclus, 

95; his death, 111. 
AKENSIDE, MARK.— Character of Solon, 172; of Pisistratus, and his usurpation, 

176, 177; Alcseus, 197; Anacreon, 201; Melpomene, 309. 
ALAMANNI, LUIGL— Flight of Xerxes, 244. 
ALC^E'US, a lyric poet.— Life and writings of, 197; 199. Extracts from: The spoils 

of war, 19S ; Sappho, 199. 

ALCiE'US, of Messene Epigrams of, on Philip V., 444. 

Alcestis, the, 323, 324. 

Alcibi / ades. Artifices of, 290 ; retires to Sparta, 291 ; intrigues of, agaiust Athens, 

293; is condemned to death, but escapes, 293; is recalled to Athens, 294; is 

banished, 294; death of, 295; 352. 
Alcin'o-us, King. Gardens of, 17. 
" Al'ciphron, or the Minute Philosopher," 352. 
ALC'MAN, a lyric poet.— Life and writings of, 195. 
Alexander the Great, 214, 257, 273, 398. Quells revolt of the Grecian states, 

40S ; invades Asia; defeats Darius, 409 ; further conquests of, 409, 412 ; feast of, at 

Persepolis, 412-415; invades India, 416; dies at Babylon, 416; career, character, 

and burial of, 417-419 ; wars that followed his death, 434-437; 460, 470. 
Alexandria, in Egypt. Founded by Alexander, 440 ; 470. 
Alex'is, a comic poet, 449. 

ALISON, ARCHIBALD.— Earthquake at Sparta, and Spartan heroism, 267. 
Alphe'us, river. Legends of, 14, 7S. 
A'mor, son of Venus, and god of love, 469. 
Amphic'tyon, Amphicty'ones, and Amphictyon'ic Council, 150, 397, 

405, 407, 433. 
Amphip'olis, in Thrace, 2S7, 341, 401. 
Amphis'sa, town of, 5, 407. 
Amy'clse, town of, 113. 
Anab'asis, the, 377, 465. 

ANACREON, a lyric poet. — Life and writings of, 201. 
An'akim, a giant of Palestine, 211. 
Anaxag'oras, the philosopher, 204; attacks upon, at Athens, 275, 276; 325; life, 

works, and death of, 344, 349, 351. 
Anaximan'der, the philosopher, 204. 
Anaxim/enes, the philosopher, 204. 
Anehi'ses, father of JSue'as, 209. 
Androm'a-che, wife of Hector, 90. Lamentation of, over Hector's body, 102 ; 

120. 
An'gelo, Michael, 149, 304. 

ANONYMOUS.— Tomb of Leonida?, 241; Queen Archidamia, 439. 
Antse'us, son of Neptune and Terra. Encounter with Hercules, 79. 
Antal'cidas, the peace of, 379, 3S1. 
Anthe'la, village of, 150. 



INDEX. 535 

ANTHON, CHARLES, LL.D.— Apelles and Protogenes, 473. 

Antig'o-ne, the, 59, 323. 

Antig'onus, one of Alexander's generals, 434; conqnests and death of, 435. 

Antig'onus II., a king of Macedon.— War of, with Phyrrus, 43S; becomes mas- 
ter of Greece, and death of, 441, 442. 

Antilochus (in the Iliad), 56. 

Anti'ochus, King of Syria, 445. 

ANTIP'ATER, of Sidon.— Extracts from: The birthplace of Homer, 134; Sappho, 
200; Desolation of Corinth, 446; The painting of Venus rising from the sea, 473. 

Antip'ater, one of Alexander's generals. Is given command of Macedon and 
Greece, 409 ; suppresses a Spartan revolt, 420 ; the Athenian revolt, 434; is given 
part of Macedonia and Greece, 434; death of, 435. 

Antiph'anes, a comic poet, 449. 

An tiphon, orator and rhetorician, 350. 

An'tium (an'she-um), a city of Italy, 149. 

Aii'tonines, the. Treatment of Greece by, 4S0. 

An'ytus, the accuser of Socrates, 354, 355. 

Apel'les, an Ionian painter, 214 ; anecdote of, 473. 

Aphrodi'te. (See Venus.) 

Apollo, the god of archery, etc., 7, 25, 26, 54; aids the Trojans, 95, 99 ; 115; char- 
acter of, 122 ; 143 ; 145 ; conflict of, with Python, 14S ; 323 ; 336 ; 347 ; 397 ; 469 ; 505. 

Apollo Bel've-dere, statue of, 149, 470. 

Apollodo'rus, of Athens, a painter, 364. 

Apollo'nia, town in Illyria, 443. 

Ap'pivis Claudius, the Roman consul, 391. 

Araen'ne, tower of, 109. 

Arbe'la. Battle of, 410. 

Arca'dia and Arcadians, 2, 11, 159. Arcadians assist Messenia, 160, 161 ; assist 
Thebes in war with Sparta, 3S3. 

Arehidami'a, Queen of Sparta, 43S. 

Areliela'us, King of Macedon, 325. 

Arehida'mus, King of Sparta, 266, 295. 

Arehil'oehus, lyric poet, 194, 300, 304. 

Arehiine'des, the Syracusan, 392 ; Cicero visits the tomb of, 393, 396. 

Architecture.— First period, 216-218. Second period, 360-363. Third period, 
46S-472. 

Ar'ehons. Institution of, in Athens, 12S ; 165. 

Areopagus, or Hill of Mars. Court of, 174, 175 ; changes in power of, 26S : 372. 

A'res (same as Mars), 159. 

Arethu'sa, fountain of, 394. 

A're-us, King of Sparta, 43S. 

Ar'gives, the, 110, 160, 161> 290, 3S3. 

Ar'go, the ship, 82. 

Argol'ic Gulf, 12. 

Ar'golis, 2, 11, 70, 144, 243. 

Argonau'tic expedition, the, 76, 81, 323. 

Ar'gos, city of, 12, 70, 75, 10S, 127, 160, 260, 261, 269, 276, 298, 300, 398, 442, 509. 

Ari'on, the poet, 196. 

Aristi'des, the Athenian general aud statesman. At Marathon, 222, 227; rise of, 
in Athenian affairs, 231; banishment of, and return to fight at Salamis, 232, 243 ; 
260 ; leadership and death. of, 263 ; 3S2, 424. 

Aristi'des, a painter, 473. 

Aristoc'rates, King of Arcadia, 161. 

Aristode'mus, one of the Heraclidae, 127. 

Aristogi ton. Conspiracy of, against the Pisistratidse, and death of, 179 ; tribute 
to, ISO. 

Aristom/enes, a Messenian leader, US, 119, 266. 

ARISTOPH'ANES, the comic poet, 310. Life and works of, 329-336 ; 351, 353, 449. 



536 INDEX. 

Extracts from : The Wasps, 259 ; Cleon the Demagogue, 2S7, 283 ; The Clouds, 
332-334 ; The Birds, 335. 

Aristot'le, the philosopher, 363, 457. Life and works of, 459-461. 

ARNOLD, EDWIN.— The Academia, 462. 

Ar'ta, Gulf of, 530. 

Artafoa'nus, uncle of Xerxes, 233, 234. 

Artapher'nes, Persian governor of Lydia, 179. 

Artaxerx'es Longim anus, 260, 261. 

Artaxerxes Mne'mon, 375. 

Ar'temis. (See Diana.) 

Artemis'ia (she-a), Queen of Caria, 46S. 

Artemis'inm. Naval conflict at, 242. 

Arts. (See Literature.) 

As'cra. Birthplace of Hesiod, 189. 

A'sius (a'she-us). A marshy place near the river Ca-ys'ter, in Asia Minor, 139. 

Aso'pus, the river, in Bosotia, 109, 255. 

Aspa'sia (she-a). Attacks upon, 275, 276. 

Asty'anax, Hector's son. Fate of, 103. 

A'te, goddess of revenge, 52, 77. 

Athe'na. (See Minerva.) 

Athenodo'rus, a Rhodian sculptor, 471. 

Athens, and the Athenians, 9; founding of the city, 71-74; 128; 167; early history 
of, 170-181; legislation of Draco and Solon, 170-175; usurpation of Pisistratns, 
176-179; birth of democracy at, 1S1 ; 198; 214; 220; battle of Marathon, 221-i23; 
affairs of, under Aristides and Themistocles, 231, 232 ; war of, with ^Egina, 232, 
and settlement of, 236; abandonment of city, 242; successes of, at Artemis- 
ium and Salamis, 242-244 ; at Plataea, 253, 256, 258 ; empire of Athens, 260-273 ; 
Athens rebuilt, 260; affairs of, under Cimou, 262-267; at battle of Euryra- 
edon, 263, 264; jealousy of Sparta against, 264; 267; affairs of, under Pericles, 
267-283 ; changes in Constitution of, 267, 268 ; war of, with Sparta, 269 ; reverses 
of, in Egypt, decline of, and thirty years' truce of, with Sparta, 270; the "Age 
of Pericles," 271; war of, with Sparta, 274-289; the plague at, 282; violates the 
Peace of Nicias, 290; Sicilian expedition of, 291; war of, with Sparta, and re- 
volt of allies, 292, 293 ; reverses and humiliation of, 293, 294; fall of Athens, 295; 
the rule of the Tyrants, 296, 297; lead of, in intellectual progress, 298; literature 
and art of, 29S-374; 300; 302; 307, 308; 310; 322; 325-328; 330, 331; 337, 338; 
341; 344; 345-348; 350; 352, 353; 360-362; 363; adornment of, 368-372; 373; 
glory of, 374, 375; 378-381; alliance of, with Sparta, 3S2; 3S6; engages in the 
Sacred War, 397; leads against Macedon, 399; censured by Demosthenes, 401- 
403; allies of, defeated by Philip, 405; first open rupture with Macedon, 406; 
alliance of, with Thebes, and defeat at Chseronea, 407; revolt of, against Alex- 
ander, 409; 420; 434; captured by An tigon us, 441; 443; 451; 456; 462-465; 467; 
late architecture, sculpture, and painting of, 46S ; 475 ; immortal influence of, 
476; 479; 482; the Duchy of Athens, 483; captured by Turks and Venetians, 
4S6; 502; 525; revolution at, against Otho, 526-528 ; 529; 532. 
A'thos, Mount, in Macedonia, 109, 221, 234, 235, 244, 412. 
Atos'sa, mother of Xerxes, 245-247; 253. 
Atri'dse, the, 87. A term meauing "sons of Atrens," and applied by Homer to 

Agamemnon and Menelaus. 
Attica, 1, 9, 71, 128, 142, 242, 264, 270, 277, 2S2, 293, 297, 327. 

" Attic Wasp," the, 258. 

Augustus, the Roman emperor, 480. 

An lis, on the Euripus, S6. 

Auso'nian, or Au'sones. An ancient race of Italy, 444. 

Aver'nus, lake of, 183. 

Babylon, 375, 412, 417. 

Bacchus, god of vintage or wine, 8 ; 196 ; 209 ; 307 ; theatre of, 326 ; 372 ; 413 ; 469. 



INDEX. 537 

Bel'i-des, a surname given to daughters of Belns, 63. 

Beller'ophon, son of Glaucus, 76. 

BENJAMIN, S. G. W.— Revolution against Otho, 526. 

Bes'sus, satrap of Bactria, 411. 

Bias, one of the Seven Sages, 203, 204. 

Birds, the, 335. 

BLACKIE, J. STUART.— Value of Greek fables, 20. Fancies of the Greek mind, 
29. Legend of Pandora, 39-42. Prometheus, 43^5. Story of Tantalus, 62. 
The founding of Athens, 71-74. Pythagoras, 205. Legends of Marathon, 224. 
Xerxes and the battle of Salamis, 250. 

Boeo'tia, 1; 7; 75; 126; 164; 1SS, 1S9; 242; 269; 270; 302. 

Boz-zar'is, Marco.— Bravery and death of, 515-520. Constantine Bozzaris, and 
Noto Bozzaris, 516. 

Bras'idas, the Spartan, 341. 

Brazen Age, the, 35. 

British Quarterly Review.— The choice of Otho, 525 ; and Greece under his rule, 
52S. 

Bria're-us (or Bri'a-reus), 20. 

BROUGHAM, LORD.— Demosthenes' Oration on the Crown, 433. The style of 
Demosthenes, 454. The doctrine of Plato, 45S. 

BROWNE, R. W._ Thucydides and Herodotus, 343. Aristotle, 460. 

BULWER, EDW. LYTTON— Merits of a "Tyranny," 166. The battle of Platan, 
254, and importance of, 257. Xerxes at Sardis, 25S. Earthquake, and revolt 
of Helots at Sparta, 265. Changes in Athenian Constitution, 268. Oratory of 
Pericles, 284. The Drama, 30S. Adornment of Athens, 368, 373. 

BURLINGAME, EDW. L.— Roman treatment of Greece, 4S0. 

BYRON, LORD.— Dodona, 4. Parnassus, 6. Allusions to Attica, 10. The Co- 
rinthian rock, 11. The Isles of Greece, 14. The dead at Thermopylae, 241. 
Xerxes at Salamis, 244. Deathless renown of Greek heroes, 280. The Athenian 
prisoners at Syracuse, 292. The revenge of Orestes, 313. Alexander's career, 
419. Siege and fall of Corinth, 488. Greece under Moslem rule, 495. Views 
of Greek independence, 521. 

Byzan'tium (she-um), 260. 

Cadmus, founder of Cadme'a, 75. 

Cadmea, citadel of Thebes, 75 ; 380. 

Cai'amis, the sculptor, 149. 

Calaure'a, island of, 434. 

Callic'ra-tes, a Spartan soldier, 254. 

Callicrates, an architect, 36S, 369. 

Callicrat'i-das, a Spartan officer, 294. 

Callim'achus, the Pol'emarch, 222. 

CALLFNUS, a lyric poet.— Writings of, 193. 

Calli'o-pe, the goddess of epic poetrv, 134. 

CALLISTRAl US.— Tribute to Harmodius, ISO. 

Calyp'so, the nymph, island of, 123, 124. 

Cambunian mountains, 2. 

CAMPBELL, THOMAS.— Music of the Spartans, 157. Song of the Greeks 509 

Battle of Navari'no, 523. 
Can'dia, island of (Crete), 502; 521; 530. 
Cannae, in Apulia. Battle at, 443. 
CANNING, GEORGE.— The Slavery of Greece, 494. 
CANTON, WILLIAM.-Death of Auaxagoras, 345. 
Capo d'Istria, Count, 525. 
Capys, a Trojan, 105. 

Carthaginians, the, 185, 1S6 ; 3S5 ; 3S7 ; 391. 
Caspian Gates, the, 411. 
Cassan'der, son of Antipater.— Master of Greece and Macedon, 435; death of, 437. 

23* 



538 INDEX. 

Cassan'dra, daughter of Priam, 107. 

Castalian Fount, the, 6. 

Cat'ana, in Sicily, 291. 

Cau'casus, Mount, 305. 

Ca-ys'ter, the river, in Asia Minor, 139. 

Ce'crops, 71, 72. 

Cecro'pian hill (Acropolis), 243. 

Celts, the, 437, 438. 

Cephalo'nia, island of, 17. 

Cephis'sus, the river, 148. 

Ceraunian mountains, 2. 

Ce'res, goddess of grain, etc., 25, 29, 143, 208, 209, 328. 

Chaerone'a, in Boeotia, 403; hattle of, 407; 420; 422; 426; 452. 

Chal'cis, in Enboea, 461. 

Cha'os, 20, 23. 

-Cha'res, a Rhodian sculptor, 470. 

Cher'siphron, a Cretan architect. Story of, 212-214. 

Chersone'sus, the Thracian, 406. 

Chitfo, one of the Seven Sages, 203. 

Chion'i-des, a comic poet, 327. 

Chi'os, island of, 134, 159, 216, 276. 

Choeph'orce, the, 311, 312. 

Christianity in Greece, 480, 481. 

Chro'nos, or Saturn, 20, 21. 

Cicero, the Roman orator. Visits tomb of Archime'des, 393-396; 451; 453. 

Cili'cia (she-a), 409. 

Ci'mon (meaning Milti'a-des), 227. 

Cimon, son of Miltiades, and an Athenian general and statesman, 229; successes 
and rise of, at Athens, 260, 262 ; wins hattle of Eurym'edon, 263 ; aids Sparta, 
267 ; the fall and banishment of, 269 ; recall of, expedition to Cyprus, and death 
of, 270, 271; 329; 372; 382. 

Cithse'ron, Mount, 8, 9, 109, 226, 315, 4SS. 

Ci'tium (she-um), in Cyprus, 270. 

Clazom'enae, on an island off the Dorian coast, 344. 

CLE-AN'THES.— Hymn to Jupiter, 23. 

Cle-ar'chus, a Spartan general, 375, 376. 

Cleo-bu'lus, one of the Seven Sage?., 203, 204. 

Cle'on, the Athenian.— Causes the Mityleneans to be put to death, 2S6, 287; con- 
duct and character of, and attacka upon, by Aristoph'anes, 287, 2SS. 

Cle'on of Lampsacus, 345. 

Cleon'ymus of Sparta, 438. 

Clouds, the, 331, 334. 

Clis'thenes (eze), last despot of Sl'cyon, 167. 

Clisthenes, founder of democracy at Athens, 167; reforms of, 180, 1S1 ; 26S. 

Clytemnes'tra, wife of Agamemnon, 108, 111, 311, 312. 

Cocy'tus, the river, 3, 357. 

Codrington, Admiral, 522, 524. 

Co'drus, early King of Athens, 74, 128, 171. 

Col'chis, 81, 82; 143. 

COLERIDGE, HENRY N.— The poems of Homer, 141. 

COLERIDGE, SAMUEL T.— Pythagore'an influences, 207. 

COLLINS, MORTIMER.— Fable of Hercules and Antse'us, 79. 

Colonies, the Greek. In Asia Minor, 126-129; history of, in Magna Grcecia, etc., 
1S2-1S7; 219; in Sicily, Italy, Africa, etc., 182-187; 3S4-396. 

Col'ophon, in Ionia, 134, 473. 

Comedy. The Old, 326-336; the New, 44S-451. 

COOK, REV. JOSEPH.— Progress in Modern Greece, 531. 

Corcy'ra, or Corfu, island of, 17, 274. 



INDEX. 539 

Corimia, a Boeotian poetess, 302. 

Corinth, and the Corinthians, 10; conquest of, 12S ; 145; 100; despotisms 

of, 107; 169; 1S3; 203; 230; war of, with Corcyra, 274; aids Syracuse, 292; 29S; 

315; 379; 390, 391; 40S ; 442; 444; destruction of, 446; 405; 470; 4S3, 4S4; 

capture of, by the Turks, 4S8-493. 
Corinthian Architecture, 212. 
Corinthian Gulf, the, 5 ; 269, 270 ; 397. 
Corone'a, plains of. Athenian defeat at, 379 ; 405. 
Coumour'gi, Al'i, the Turkish Grand Vizier. Successes of, 487-493. 
Councils, the National, 150. 

CRANCH, CHRISTOPHER P.— Temples at Paestum, 215. 
Cran'non, battle of, 434. 

Crat'erus, one of Alexander's generals, 434, 435. 
Crati'nus, a comic poet, 329. 
Creation, the. Account of, 32. 
Cre'on, 316. 

Cresphon'tes, of the Heraclidae, 127. 
Crete, island of, 15; 01; 212; 210; conquered by the Turks, 486; revolution in, 

530. • 

Cris'sa, town of, 397. 
Crissse'an plain, 146. 

Cri'ti-as (cii'she-as), chief of the Thirty Tyrants, 297. 
Croe'sus, King of Lydia, 219; 33S; 411. 
CROLY, GEORGE.— Pericles, 271. Death of Pericles, 2S4. 
Croto'na, in Italy, 1S4, 1S5 ; 205. 
Crusaders, the. Courts of, in Greece, 4S3. 

Ctes'iphon, who proposed a crown for Demosthenes, 420, 421, 422; 42S; 430. 
Cu'mse, in Italy, 1S2 ; 3S4, 3S5. 
Cumae'an Sibyl, the. Myth of, 1S3. 
CURTIUS, ERNST.— The Oration of Pericles, 2S1. Retreat of the Ten Thousand, 

377. Pelopidas and Epaminondas, 3S2. 
Cyc'la-des, the (islands), 15; 524. 
Cyclic poets, the, 1SS. 

Cy'clops, or Cyclo'pes, the, 12 ; 20 ; 70 ; 211. 
Cy'lon, the Athenian, 171. 

Cynoceph'alae, in Thessaly. Battle of, 443, 444. 
Cyprian queen (Venus), 137. 
Cyprus, island of, 260; 270. 
Cyrena'ica, colony of, 182. 
Cy-re'ne, colony of, 1S7. 
Cyropcedi'a, the, 465. 

Cyrus the Elder. Conquers Lydia, 219. 
Cyrus the Younger, 294 ; 375. 
Cys'icus, island of. Victory of Alcibiades at, 294. 
Cyth'era, island of, 15. 
Cytherse'a, name given to Venus, 16. 

Damon and Pythias, 387-3S9. 

Dan'a-e, Lamentation of, 300, 301. 

Dan'a-i, the, 75. 

Dau'a-us, founder of Argos^ 75. 

Dar'danus, son of Jupiter and Electra, 101. 

Dari'us I. (Hystas'pes), King of Persia, 179 ; dominion of, 219 ; he suppresses the 

Ionic revolt, 220; invades Greece, 221; death of, 233; 338. 
Darius III., King of Persia. Defeated at Issns, 409, and at Arbe'la, 411 ; flight 

and death of, 410-412 ; 414. 
De-iph'obus, a Trojan hero, 112. 
De Hum, in Boeotia. Battle of, 359. 



540 INDEX. 

Del'plii, or Delphos. City, temple, and oracle of, 7: 74; 144, 145; 150, 151; 
154; 160; 214; 315; 336; 397; 43S ; 485. 

De'los, island of, 14, 15; Confederacy of States at, 264; 295. 

Deme'ter. (See Ceres.) 

Demetrius, son of Antigonus. Seizes the throne of Macedon, 437; 474. 

Demos'the-nes, the Athenian general. Captures Pylus, 287; defeat and death 
of, at Syracuse, 292. 

DEMOS'THE'NES, the orator, 372 ; 404, 405, 406 ; pious fraud of, 40S ; measures 
against, at Athens, 420, and attack upon, by ^Esehiues, 421-427; death of, 434; 
452 ; oratory of, 454 — Extracts from : The First Philippic, 401-403. Oration on 
the Crown, 427. 

Deuca'lion, son of Prometheus. Deluge of, 32; 4S-52; 75; 147. 

Diana, or Ar'temis, S; 25; temple to, at Ephesus, 212-214; 469. 

Die'foitsch, Marshal, 525. 

Dio-cles, of Syracuse, 386, 3S7. 

Diodo'rus, the historian, 239 ; 205. 

Diog'enes, the Cretan, 204. 

DIOG'ENES LAER'TIUS.— Xenophon, 466. 

Di'omed, a Greek hero in the Trojan war, 87; valor of, 9#; 106; fate of, 111. 

Di'on, of Syracuse, 389, 390. 

Dionysian Festivals, the, 32S. 

Dionysius of Colophon, a painter, 363. 

Dionysius the Elder, of Syracuse, 3S6-3S8; 390; 394. 

Dionysius the Younger, of Syracuse, 3S9, 390; 411. 

Dionysius, the Roman historian, 452 ; 456. 

Diopi'thes, the general, 450. 

Dipoe'nus, the sculptor, 210. 

Dis, a name given to Pluto, 61. 

Dodo'na, city and temple of, 4, 5 ; 144 ; 336. 

Do'rians, the, 5; 76; migrations and colonies of, 127, 128- 153; 156; 164; 182; 326. 

Dor'ic architecture, 212. 

Doris, 1 ; 5. 

Do'rus, progenitor of the Dorians, 75. 

Dra'co, the Athenian legislator, 170 ; 173. 

Drama, the. Before Peloponnesian wars, 307-336 ; characterization of, 30S; in- 
fluence of, 320 ; the drama after Peloponnesian wars, 44S-451. 

Dry'ads, or Dry'a-des, the. Wood-nymphs, 16; 31 ; 144. 

DRYDEN, JOHN.— Alexander's feast at Persep'olis, 413-415. 

Edinburgh Review. Courts of Crusaders, 483. 

Eges'ta, in Sicily, 291. 

E'lea, in Lucania. Eleatic philosophy, 205; 352. 

Elec'tra, the, 145. 

Eleu'sis, and the Eleusinian Mysteries, 20S-210 ; 270 ; 291 ; 309. 

Eleu'therae, in Attica, 300. 

E'lis and E leans, 2 ; 14 ; 383 ; 406 ; 443. 

Elo'ra, temple of, 310. Elora is a town in south-western Hindostan, noted for its 
splendid cave-temples, cut from a hill of red granite, black basalt, and quartz 
rock. Of these, that called "Paradise," to which reference is here made, is 100 
feet, high, 401 feet deep, and 1S5 feet in greatest breadth. It is "a perfect 
pantheon of the gods of India." 

Elysium, the, 04; 200; 210; 306. 

Ema'thia, or Macedon, S ; 444. 

En'nius. The Fate of Ajax, 111. 

Eny'o, a war-goddess, 59. 

E'os, 110. The same as Aurora, a term applied to the eastern parts of the world. 

Epaminon'das, the Theban. Character of, and his successes against Sparta, 
382, 383 ; 399 ; 496. 



INDEX. 541 

Ephesus, 204 ; 212 ; 214 ; 220 ; 409 ; 470. 

Ephi-al tes, 268. 

Kpichar'mus, 326 ; 3S5. 

Epicurus, 450. Life and works of, 463. 

Epidau'rus, in Argolis, 143, 144; 50S. 

Epime theus (thuse), 3S-43. 

Epi'rus, 1, 2, 3, 4; 126; 39S; 406; 446; 530. 

Er-eeh'the-um, the, 371. 

Erech'theus (thuse), 72. 

Ere'tria, 225; 293. 

Erin'uys. (See Furies.) 

Eubce'a, island of, 15; 1SS; 220; 222; 270; 293; 406. 

Euboe'an Sea, 7; 15; 242; 461. 

Eu'menes, Alexander's general, 435. 

Eumen'i-dcs, the, 311, 312. 

Euphra'nor, a sculptor, 470. 

Eu'polis, a comic poet, 329. 

Eupom'pus, a Sicyonian painter, 472. 

EUItlP'lDES, 292. Life and works of, 321-325; 344; 448. Extracts from- The 

Greek Armament, S6. Alcestis preparing for death, 324. 
Euri'pus, or Eubcean Sea, 7 ; 15 ; 109. 
Euro'tas, 13; 153; 156; 161; 236; 3S3 ; 495. 
Eurybi'ades, a Spartan general, 242, 243. 
Euryd'i-ce, 63. 
Eurym'edon, in Pamphylia, 263. 

Farnese Bull, the. Sculpture of, 470. 
Fates, the, 26; 64; 323. 

FE i L J° w °\ °" P I i D -~J !o aU hn ^ m Se and culture, 130-134. Unity of the Iliad, 
lit' The' Klf MMW v Chdstiauity iu Greece ' 4S0 - The Duch y of Athens, 
Festivals, the Grecian, 144. 

FINLAY, GEORGE, LL.D.-The Revolt against Rome, 479. 
Flamin'ius, Titus, Roman consul, 443, 444. 
Frogs, the, 310 ; 449. 

Furies, the, 20; 52; 56; 64; 312, 313; 414. 
Future State, the. Greek views of, 60. 

Gan-y-me'de, Jove's cup-bearer, 54. 
Gedro'sia (she-a), in Persia, 416. 
Ge'la, in Sicily, 1S3; 1S6. 

^tuT"' fa 6 *! ^ ° f Gela * BeC ° meS deSpot of s y racnsc . 186 ; 3S4; dynasty of, ex- 

GEM'INUS, TULLTDS.— Themistocles, 262. 

George, Prince of Denmark. Is chosen King of Greece, 529, 530; progress 

of Greece under, 531, 532. F a 

Giants, the, 20 ; battle with Jupiter, 21. 

GI 9Q L r IE ^, J ° HN ; LL ;^T? Ien T ial t0 Miltindes, 231. Aristophanes and Cleon, 
2S7. The works of Phidias, 361. 

Gladiator, the Dying, 470. 

GLADSTONE, WM. E WART. -The humanity of the gods, 53. 

Glau'cus, a Trojan hero, 95. 

Glaucus, a sculptor, 210. 

G °,2 8 ™ he /n Personificatious ™d deifications of, 26-31; moral characteristics of, 
52-60; 90; deceptions of, 121. 

Golden Age, the, 34. 

Gor'gias, the Sophist, 350. 
Gorgo'pis, lake, near Corinth, 109. 



542 INDEX. 

Goths, the. Overrun Greece, 482; 485. 

Government, forms of, and changes in, 162-169. 

Graces, the, 26 ; 3T; 321. 

Grani'cus, the river. Battle at, 409. 

GRAY, THOMAS.— Pindar, 305. 

GROTE, GEORGE.— The Trojan war, 110. The Cumaean Sibyl, 1S3. Increase of 
power among Sicilian Greeks, 1S5. The Seven Sages, 204. Lesson from the 
fate of Miltiades, 230. Transitions of tragedy, 325, 326. Aristophanes, 330. 
The Sophists and Socrates, 351; 385. Demosthenes' first Philippic, 403. The 
influence of Phocion, 404. Conquests of Alexander, 411. The Oration on the 
Crown, 427. 

Guiscard (ges-kar'), Robert. Conquests of, 483. 

Gy'ges, the, 20. 

Gylip'pus, a Spartan general, 292. 

Gythe-um (or Gy-the'-um), port of Sparta, 439. 

Ha'des, 59; 64; 312; 358. 

Ha'drian, the Roman emperor, 480. 

Hae'mus, mountain chain of, 39S. 

Halicarnas'sus, in Caria, 337; 46S. 

HALLECK, FITZ-GI>2ENE.— Marco Bozzaris, 517. 

Hamil'car, a Carthaginian general, 186. 

Hannibal, a Carthaginian general, 443. 

Harmo'dius, an Athenian, 179, ISO. 

Har'pies, the, 17. Winged monsters with female faces and the bodies, claws, 
and wings of birds. 

HAYGARTH, WILLIAM. —Acheron and Acherusia, 4. Ancient Corinth, 11. 
Sparta's invincibility, 236. Battle of Thermopylae, 23S. Athens in time of 
peace, 272. Temple of Theseus, 373. The Academia, 457. Immortality of 
Grecian genius, 478. 

He'be, goddess of youth, 54. 

Hecatae'us, the historian, 336, 337. 

Hec'tor, eldest son of Priam, King of Troy, 88 ; parting of, with Androma-che, 
90; exploits of, 95; encounters Achilles, is slain, and his body given up to 
Priam, 99; 101; lamentation over, by Andromache and Helen, 102, 103; 137. 

HEE'REN (ha'ren).— Authority of Homer, 118. Freedom in colonies, 164. Char- 
acter of a "tyranny," 166. 

He-ge'sias (she-as), the sculptor, 149. 

Helen of Troy. Abduction of, 86 ; the name of, S7; 90 ; laments Hector's death, 
103; 110; supposed career of, after the Trojan war, 111-115; 120; 415. 

Hel'icon, Mount, in Boeotia, 8, 9; 189; 511. 

Hel'las, or Greece, 1; S7; 107; 142; 145; 152; 241; 299; 302; 381; 447; survival 
of, 474 ; 521. 

Hellas, the, 502-508. 

Hellenes, and Hellenic (Hellen), 1 ; 75 ; 118 ; 143; 360; 39S ; 446; 494; 500; 
spirit of, in modern Greece, 531, 532. 

Hellen'ica, the, 465. 

Hellen'ics, the, 112. 

Hellespont, the, 81; 221; 233, 234, 235; 244; 253; 257; 294; 406; 409; 411, 412. 

Helots, the, 156; 159. The revolt of, 264-267; 496. 

HEMANS, FELICIA.— Mount Olympus, 2. Vale of Tempe, 3. City and temple 
of Delphi, 7. Mycenae, 13. Spartan march to battle, 157. Legend of Marathon, 
223. The Parthenon, 370. The Turkish invasion, 4S4. 

Hephaestus, or Vulcan, 54. 

Hera. (See Juno.) 

Her-a-cli'dae, the return of the, 127. ^ 

Heracli'tus, the philosopher, 204; 344. 

Hercules, 5; 12, 13; frees Prometheus, 45; 7G; twelve labors, &c, of, 77-S0; 



INDEX. 543 

fable of, T8 ; encounter of, with Antae'ns, 79 ; sails with Argonautic expedition, 

82, S3; S5; 143; 145; legends of, at Marathon, 223; 323; statue of, 470. 
Her'mes. (See Mercury.) 
Hermi'o-ne, 112; 114. 
HEROD'OTUS, the historian, 186; 235; 239; 241; 245; 325. Life and writings of, 

337-341; compared with Thucydides, 343; 39S ; 467.— Extracts from: Xerxes at 

Abydos, 233. Introduction to history, 338. 
Heroic Age, the. Some events of, 70-115 ; arts and civilization in, 110-125 ; 163. 
Heros'tratus, 214. 
Her'tha, goddess of the earth, 80. 
HE'SI-OD, 19; 35; 122; 424. Life and works of, 18S-192.— Extracts from: Battle 

of the Giants, 21. Origin of Evil, etc., 37-39. The justice of the gods, 56. 

Winter, 190. 

Hi'ero I. Despot of Gela, 180 ; 302 ; becomes despot of Syracuse, 384, 3S5 ; 3S7. 

Hiero II. Despot of Syracuse, 391, 392. 

Him'era, in Sicily, 1S5, 1S6; 384. 

Hippar'chus, 179; 201. 

Hippias, son and successor of Pisistratus. Is driven from Athens, 179; 181; 

leads the Persians against Greece, 221. 
Hippocre'ne (or crene' in poetry), fountain of, 8. 
Hippopla'cia (also Hypopla'kia), 91. Same as The'be, in Mysia, and so called 

because supposed to lie at the foot of or under Mount Plakos. 
History. To close of Peloponuesian wars, 336-343 ; subsequent period of, 464-467. 
HOLLAND, J. G.-The La-oc'o-on, 472. 

HOMER, 19; 53; 63; 86, S7; 104; 110, 111; 110-120; 125; 129; 131; 178; 195; 216; 
313. Life and works of, 134-142.— Extracts from : The gardens of Alcin'o-us, It! 
Prayer to the gods, 55. The taking of an oath, 59. The Future State, 61. The 
descent of Orpheus, 64. The Elysium, 64. Punishment of Ate, 77. Ulysses and 
Thersites, SS. Parting of Hector and Andromache, 90. Death of Patroclus, 95. 
The shield of Achilles, 96. Death of Hector, 99. Priam begging for Hector's 
body, 99. Lamentation of Andromache, 102 ; of Helen, 103. Artifice of Ulysses, 
121. The Raft of Ulysses, 123. Similes of Homer, 139. Jupiter grants the 
request of Thetis, 363. 
HORACE.— Description of Pindar, 305. Greece the conqueror of Rome, 447. 
Horolo'gium, the, at Athens, 468. 
HOUGHTON, LORD.-The Cyclopean walls, 211. 
HUME, DAVID.-The style of Demosthenes, 456. 
Huns, the. Overrun Greece, 4S2. 
Hy'las, legend of, 83-85. 
Hymet'tus, Mount, 9, 10. 
Hype'ria's Spring, in Thessaly, 92. 

Ib'rahim Pa/sha (or pa-shii'), 54. 
Ica'ria, island of, 307. 
Icti'nus, the architect, 369. 
I'da, Mount, S3; 108. 

Idalian queen (same as Venus), 176. 

Il'iad, the, 53; 55; 59; 64; 77; 8S; 90; 95,96; 117; 120; 135; 137; 142; 190; 192; 
313 ; 363. 

Il'i-um, or Troy. Grecian expedition against, 86 ; the fate of, 104-107 ; fall of, 

announced to the Greeks, 108 ; discoveries on site of, 110. 
Illyr'ia, 398, 399; 400; 408; 443. 
Im'bros, island of, 85. 
In'achus, son of Oceauus, 70. 
In'arus, a Libyan prince, 270. 
Iol'cus, in Thessaly, 81-S3. 
Ton, son of Xuthus, 76. 
ION, of Chios. The power of Sparta, 159 ; 448. 



544 INDEX. 

Io nia, and Ionians, 76; 127; language and culture of, 130, 131; 164; 1S2; 203; 

colonies of, 219-221 ; 298 ; 333 ; 473 ; 529, 530. 
Ionian Sea, 1, 2 ; 10. 
Ion'ic Architecture, 212. 
Ionic Revolt, the, 219-221. 
I'os, island of, 134. 
Ip'sara, isle of, 521. 
I'ra, fortress of, in Messenia, 161. 
I'ris, the rainbow goddess, 54; 101. 
Isag'oras, the Athenian, 180, 1S1. 
Isles of Greece, the, 14. 
Isoc'ra-tes, an Athenian orator, 452. 
Is'sus, in Cilicia. Battle of, 409; 411. 
Isthmian Games, the, 145; 444. 
Italy, Greek colonies in, 182. 
Ithaca, island of, 17; 111. 
Itho'me, fortress of, 159; 266, 267; 269, 270. 
Ixi on. The punishment of, 63, 64. 

Jason, 81, 82, 83; 323. 

Jove. (See Jupiter.) 

Julian, the Roman emperor, 482. 

Juno, or Hera, 25; 77; temple of, at Samos, 212; temple of, near Platsea, 254: 

315; 469. 
Jupiter, Jove, or Zeus. Court of, 2; temple of, and games sacred to, 14; 20, 

21, 22; hymn to, 23; divides dominion of the universe, 25; 29; 34; 37; 40; 43-45; 

49; 51; 77; 99; 143; 145; 214; 347; 363; 40S; 413; 469; statue of, at Tarentumi 

470; 505. 
Justin, the Latin historian, 239. 
JUVENAL. — Stories about Xerxes, 235. Flight of Xerxes from Salamis, 244. 

Alexander's tomb, 419. 

Kalama'ta, 501. 

KENDUICK, A. C, LL.D.— Plato and his writings, 458. 

Klephts, the, 497, 498. 

Knights, the, 287, 2SS. 

Kot'tos, 20. 

Lac-e-dse'mon, or Sparta, 13; 15S; 240; 256; 265; 267; 274; 2S6; 296; 382; 402; 
426; 496. 

taco'nia, 2; 13; 156; 265; 383. 

I,sevi'nus, M. Valerius, 443. 

Ivam'aehus, an Athenian general, 291. 

Lamp'sacus, on the Hellespont, 296; 345. 

LANDOR, WALTER SAVAGE Reconciliation of Helen and Meuelaus, 112. 

LANG, A.— Venus visits Helen of Troy, 114. Reconciliation of Helen and Meue- 
laus, 115. 

La>oc'o-on, a priest of Apollo, 105. Statuary group of the Laocoon, 471. 

ILap'ithse, a people of Thessaly, 135. 

LAWBENCE, EUGENE. — The murder of Agamemnon, 312. Herodotus, 338. 
Menander, 451. Aristotle, 461. 

L,efoade'a, temple and oracle of, 144. 

LEGARE" (le-gre')i HUGH S.— Character of a Greek democracy, 163. The elo- 
quence of JEschines, 453. The eloquence of Demosthenes, 455. 

I.em'nian (relating to Vulcan), 365. 

Lem'nos, island of, 15 ; 365. 

JLeon Idas, a Spartan king. Bravery and death of, at Thermopylae, 236-241; the 
tomb of, 241, 242; 515. 



index. 545 

Leotyeh'i-des, 379. 

Lepan'to, 5. 

Lernae'an Lake, 13. 

Les'bos, island of, 199; 27C; 2S6; 293. 

Le'the, 3; 115; 210. 

Leu'cas, or L«ucadia, 17. 

leu'ce, in the Euxine Sea, 469. 

Leuc'tra, in Boeotia. Battle of, 3S2, 3S3. 

LIDDELL, HENRY G, D.D.-Legeuds of the Greeks, 2S. 

Literature and the Arts. In the Ionian colonies, 130-134; the poems of 
Homer, 134-142. 1. Progress of, before the Persian wars, 1SS-21S; poems of 
Hesiod, 183-192; lyric poetry, 192-202; philosophy, 202-210; early architecture, 
211-215; early sculpture, 216-218. 2. Progress of, from the Persian to close of 
Peloponnesiau wars, 29S-374; lyric poetry, 299-306; the Drama-tragedy, 30S- 
320; old comedy, 326-336; early history, 336-343; philosophy, 344-359;° sculpture 
and painting, 360-367; architecture, 367-374. 3. Progress of, after Pelopon- 
iiesian wars, 448-473; the drama, 44S-450; oratory, 451-456; philosophy, 456- 
404; history, 464-467; architecture and sculpture, 46S-472; paiutiu"- 472-474 

Livy, the Roman historian, 392; 467. °' 

Lo'cris, and Locrians, 1; 5; 270; 276. 
LOWELL, JAMES RUSSELL.-A Pythagorean fantasy, 207. 

LUB'KE, WILIIELM.-Art at Athens, 360. Phidias and his work, 361, 363 The 
Dying Gladiator, 470. ' 

^n C ™T T To e ? elphiC ° racle ' 12S - Alexander's career and character, 417. 

LUCRE TIUS (she-us).-The plague at Athens, 2S2. Epicurus, 463 

Lyceum, the, at Athens, 17S; 460. 

Lycur'gus, the Spartan law-giver, 145; legislation of, 153-161. 

Lyric Poetry. Before the Persian wars, 192-202; from Persian to close of Pelo- 

poimesian wars, 299-306. 
Lysan'der, a Spartan general. Acts of, 294-297; 37S, 379. 
Ly'si-as (slie-as), an Athenian orator, 452. 
Lysic'ratas, monument to, 468. 
Lysim'a-ehus, Alexander's geueral, 434. 
Lysip'pus, of Sicyon. Works of, 470. 

Maca'ria, plain of, 14; 227. 

^M^l™™^"****' 339 ' LUei ' atnre ° f Albens ' and her i"imortal 

M %t ea ?X' ° r Macedo nia > 152 - Invasion of, by the Persians, 221; by Xerxes 
nf Lt ? a r C ° lome& ; in ' 2G4 ! 273 ; 325 ; 38 °. 381; supremacy of, 397-419; sketch 
of 39S; interference of, in affairs of Greece, 399; war of, with Greece 405-409 
with Persia, 409-418; revolt of Sparta against, 420; 434; 437; invasion of%y^2' 

M^ltr 1 * ™ P ^ rb, Vf - 441 ' 442 ' *«i inquest of, by Rome, 445; 46of 509. 

Macis'tus, Mount, m Eubcea, near Eretria, 109. 

Mae-o'tis, same as Sea of Azof, 333. 

MAHAFFY, J P -The society of Olympus, 52. Political life of the Greeks, 116 
Domestic life in the Heroic Age, 120. Hesiod's description of the Styx 192 
Archilochus, 194. Stesich'orus, 197. Barbarities in the Peloponnesian vars," 
296. Simomdeo, 299. ^schylus, 313. The "Alcestis" of Euripides 324 

SKKrftL* S ° PhiStS ' 35 °' "■ S ° CrateS ' 351 - Late G-ek t'gedy; 
Magne'sia (she-a), 261. 
Mah'moud, the Sultan, 504-507. 
Mantine'a, in Arcadia, 290; 380; 383; 397; 465 

M ^*^r^ be 9 J la £S 1 22 V' battle ° f ' a,ld le = ends ^nected with, 222-229, 
230, 232, 2„3, 245; 300; 309; 362; 424; 462; 479; 4S5; 503; 509. 

Mardo nms, Persian general. First invasion of Greece, 221 ; his second invasion 

and defeat at Marathon, 221-223; defeated at Plata*, and is'slain, ^SSS^ST 



546 INDEX. 

Mars, 25; 59; 90; 97; 102; 140. 

Mavrocorda'to, Alexander, 50S. 

Medea, 83; 323. 

Medea, the, 322. 

Meg'ara, 109; 10S, 169; 171; 2T0; 275; 277; 327. 

Me'lian nymphs, 20. They watched over gardens and flocks of sheep. 

Me'los, island of, 276; 290. 

Melpom'e-ne, inventress of tragedy, 308. 

Memno'nian Palace, 235. So called because said to have been founded by 

the father of Memnon. 
Memorabil'ia, the, 465. 
MENAN'DER, the comic poet, 322. Life and works of, 449. Fragment from, 

451. 
Men-e-la/us, 56; 64; 86, 87; 90; 95; 112-115; 120; 122. 
Men'tor, a friend of Ulysses, 123. 

Mercury, or Her'mes, 25; 37; 40; 45; 54; 71; 122; 176; 291; 365. 
Messa'na, in Sicily, 183; 391. 
Messa'pion, Mount, in Bceotia, 109. 
Messe'nia, and Messe'nians, 2; 13; 127; wars of, with Sparta, 159, 160; 266, 

267; 276. 
Messenian Gulf , 13. 
Messenian wars, the, 159, 160; 267; 270. 
Metamorphoses, the, 25; 32; 48; 63; 148. 
Mi'con, a painter, 363. 
Mile tus, in Ionia, 203, 204; 220; 293; 336. 
Milti'a-des, the Athenian general, etc. Commands at Marathon, 222; disgrace 

and death of, 229; lesson of, 230; 300; 382; 424; 426. 
MILTON, JOHN.— Cocytus and Acheron, 3; 21. Heroic times foretold, 76. Xerxes 

crosses the Hellespont, 235. Reference to Alcestis, 323. Socrates, 331. Ora- 
tory, 451. 
Mi'mas, a mountain-range of Ionia, 333. 
Minerva, 9, 10; 25; 37; 71; 74; 90; 97; 104; 106; 121, temple of, 261; statue of, 

at Athens, 272; 362; 369; 371; 408; 469; 471; 4S5. 
Mi'nos, Cretan law-giver, 61; 76; 154. 
Minot'ti. Story of, 48S-493. 
Missolon'ghi. The sortie at, 514-516; 521; 522. 
MITCHELL, THOMAS The Old Comedy, 327. Style of Plato, 459. Xenophon, 

465. 
MITFORD, WILLIAM.— ^Eschylus's account of Salamis, 245. Character of 

Pericles, 285. 
Mityle'ne, 198; 203; 2S6, 2S7; 295. 
Mnemos'y-ue, mother of the Nine Muses, 115. 
Mnes'icles, a sculptor, 36S, 369. 
Mnes'theus, 426.— A great-grandson of Erechtheus, who deprived Theseus of the 

throne of Athens, and led the Athenians in the Trojan war. 
Molda'via, 501. 

Monembas'i'a, 502. On the south-east coast of Laconia. 
More a, 1; 501; 509; 521, 522; 524. 
Morosi'ni, a Venetian admiral, 4S6. 
Mum'mius, a Roman consul, 446. 

MURE, WILLIAM.— The " Works and Days " of Hesiod, 1S9. Alcmau, 196. 
Muses, the Nine, 7, S; 26; 54; 138; 308; 321; 330; 511. 
Myc'a-le. Defeat of Persians at, 258. 
Mycenae, 8; 77; 211; 312. 
My'ron, a painter, 360. 
Myr'tis, a poetess, 302. 
Mys'ia (she-a), 83. 
Mythology, Grecian, 19-69. 



index. 547 

Na-i'a-des, or Nai ads, the, 16; 27; 144. 
Nap'oli di Roma'nia, 509; 517; 52S. 
Naupac'tus, 5; 270. 
Nau'pli-a, 509 ; 525. 
Navari'no, 502; battle of, 522-524. 
Nax'os, in Sicily, 1S3; 225. 
Ne-ap'olis, ill Italy, 1S2. 
Ne'mea, city of, 13. 
Ne'mean games, 13, 145. 
Ne'mean lion, 77; 143. 

Nem'esis, a female avenging deity, 213; 230; 313. 

Neptune, or Poseidon, 20; 25; 29; 31; 51; 71; 74; 99; 140; 143; 145: 371; tem- 
ple of, 434; 471. ' 
Ner-e'i-des, or Ner'e-ids, 1G; 50; 144; 446. 
Nestor, a Greek hero and sage, 94; 123; 138. 
Ni'ci-as (she-as), the Peace of, 290. 
Nl'ci-as, the Athenian general, 290, 291, 292. 
Ni'ci-as, a painter, 473. 
Ni'o-be, and her children, 469. 

Oaths, of the gods, etc., 5S. 

O-ce-an'i-des, the, 1G.— Ocean-nymphs and sisters of the rivers; supposed per- 
sonifications of the various qualities and appearances of water. 
O-ce'anus, god of the ocean, 45; 70. 
O-de'um, the, 272; 372. 

Ody'ssey, the, 17; 53; 61; 64; 111, 112; 119, 120,121; 123; 135; 141, 142; 183; 313; 357 
(Ed'ijms Tyran'nus, the, 8; 314-319. 
03'ta, Mount, 3. 

Olym'pia, in E'lis, 14; 145; 337; 339; statue of Jupiter at, 303. 
Olym'piad, 145. 

Olym'pian Jove. Temple of, 214; statue of, 272. 

Olympus, Mount, 2, 3; 15; 21, 22; 25; society of, 52-54; 72; 251; 332; 363. 
Olyn'thus, in Macedonia, 3S0, 3S1. 
Oratory, 451^*56. 
O're-ads, the, 27; 144. 
Ores'tes, son of Agamemnon, 146; 312. 
Or'pheus (pheiis), the musician, 63. 
Orthag'oras of Sicyon, iG7. 
Ortyg'ia, in Sicily, 390. 
Os'sa, Mount, 3 ; 251. 

Otho, King of Greece, 516; 525; revolution against and deposition of, 526-52S 
O'thrys Mountains, 530. 

OVID— Apollo, 25. The Creation, 32-36. Deluge of Deucalion, 4S-52. The De- 
scent of Orpheus, 63. Apollo's Conflict with Python, 14S. 

Paes'tum. Ruins of temples at, 215. 
Pag'asse, Gulf of, 400. 

Painting, 363-367; 472-474. 

Palame'des, a Greek hero, 87. 

Pallas (same as Minerva), 72; 90; 228. 

Pami'sus, the river, 13. 

Pam'philus, a painter, 473. 

Pan, 12; S4; legend of, 223, 224; 505. -The god of shepherds, in form both man 

and beast, having a horned head and the thighs, legs, and feet of a °-oat. 
Pan'darus, a Trojan hero, 90. 
Pando'ra, legend of, 3S-43. 
Paradise Lost, the, 21; 76. 
Par'cae, or Fates, 193. 



54:8 INDEX. 

Paris, of Troj r . Abducts Helen, 86; combat of, with Menelaus, 90; kills Achil- 
les, 111. 

Parmen'ides, 205. 

Parnas'sus, Mount, 6; 51; 14S; 4S5; 524. 

Par'nes, mountains of, 9. 

Par'non, mountains of, 13. 

Pa'ros, an island of the Cyclades group, 194; 229; 369; 469. 

Parrha'sius (she-us). Anecdotes of, 214 ; 364, 365 ; 472. 

Parthenon, the, 272; 362; glories of, 369, 370; destruction of, 4S0. 

Passa/rowitz, in Servia. The peace of, 493. Concluded between Austria and 
Venice on the one side, and Turkey on the other. 

Pa'trse, 12. 

Patro'clus, a Greek hero, S7; 95; 101; 107. 

Pausa'nia's, a Spartan general. At Platsea, 253-256; 200; treason, punishment, 
and death of, 261 ; 264, 265 ; 300. 

Pax'os, island of, 17. 

Peg'asus, the winged horse, 5. 

Pelas'gians, the, 70; 113. 

Pe'leus, 100. 

Pe'li-as, 81. 

Pe'li-on, Mount, 3; 85. 

Pelle'ne, or Cassandra, in Achaia, 502. 

Pelop'idas, the Thebau, 3S2, 383; 399. 

Peloponnesus, the, 1; 10; 75; 115; 126-129; 161; 269, 270; 274; 276, 277; 283; 
347; 406; 4S3; 4S0, 4S7; 493. 

Peloponnesian Avars, the, 273, 274; the first war, 276-2S9; the second war, 
292-295. 

Pe'lops, 75. 

Penel'o-pe, wife of Odysseus, 120. 

Pene'us, the river, 2, 3; 7«; 126. 

Pentel'icus, or Mende'li, Mount, 9, 10; 224; 228; 369. 

Pen'tlieus, King of Thebes, S. 

Perdic'cas, Alexander's general, 435. 

Perian'der, despot of Corinth, 167; 196; one of the Seven Sages, 203, 204. 

Pericles, the Athenian general, etc. Accedes to power in place of Cimon, 267; 
constitutional changes made by, at Athens, 268 ; measures of, for war with 
Sparta, 269; defeat of, at Tauagra, 269; recalls Cimon, 270; progress under his 
rule, 271, 272; 274, 275; attacks upon, at Athens, 275, 276; declares war against 
Sparta, 276, 277; oration of, 277-2S1; death and character of, 283-286; 290; 329, 
330; 344, 345-348; 361; 367; 373; 382; 451; 469; 487. 

Persep'olis. Alexander's feast at, 412-415. 

Per'seiis (or se'us), 76; 301. 

Perseus, King of Macedon, 445. 
Persians, the, 245-250 ; 311 ; 503. 

Persian wars, the. Account of, 219-258; 338; 360. 
Phce'do, the, 356; 458. 

Phale'rum, bay of, 243; 269. 

Phe'rse, in Thessaly, 323. 

Phid'ias, the sculptor, 14; 218; 272; 275; the work and masterpieces of, 360-363; 

368; 370; 468. 
PHILE'MON, the comic poet, 322. Life and works of, 499. 

Philip of Macedon, 10; 151; 397, 398; interference of, in Grecian affairs, 399, 
400; invades Thessaly, 400; attacks of Demosthenes against, 401-403, 404; capt- 
ures Olynthus, 405, 406; reveals his designs against Greece, and defeats Athens 
and Thebes at Chseronea, 407; is invested with supreme command, and declares 
war against Persia, 40S; death of, 408; 422, 423; 460. 
Philip V. of Macedon, 442 ; defeat of, at Apollonia and Cynocephaloe, 443, 444. 
Philippics, the, 401 ; 406. 



INDEX. 549 

Phil'ocles, bravery of, 296. 

Philopoe men, 443. 

Philosophy. Before the Persian wars, 202-210 ; to close of Pelopouuesiau wars, 

344-359; subsequent to Peloponnesian wars, 456-404. 
Phleg'ethon, or Pyr-iphleg'ethon, C4; 357. 

Pho'cion (she-on), Athenian statesman. Opposes the policy of Demosthenes, 404. 
Pho'cis and Phocians, 1 ; 6; 1SS; 230; 241; 270; 276; sacrilege of, and war 

with, 397, 39S, 399, 400; 405; 407; 430; 438. 
Phoe'fous, the sun-god (Apollo), 14; 41; 135; 14S. 
Phoe'nix, warrior and sage, 55 ; 105. 
PHRYN'ICHUS, 307. Tribute to Sophocles, 320. 
Phy'le, 424; 426; 495. A fortress in a pass of Mount Parnes, north-west from 

Athens. This was the point seized by Thrasybulus in the revolt against the 

Thirty Tyrants (see p. 297). 
PJ-e'ri-an fount, 2. 
Pi-er'i-des, name given to the Muses, 9. 
Pi'e-rus, or Pi-e'ri-a, Mount, 2 ; 9 ; 200. 
Pi'e-rus, King of Emathia, 8. 
PIN'DAR, 157 ; 299. Life and writings of, 302-306 ; 3S4, 3S5. Extracts from : The 

Greek Elysium, 65; Christening of the Argo, S2; Spartan music and poetry, 

15S; Tribute to Theron, 1S4; Athenians at Artemisinm, 242; Threnos, 306; 

Founding of ^Etna, 3S4; Hiero's victory at Cumas, 3S5; Admonitions to Iliero! 

3S5. 
Pin'dus, mountains of, 2; 126; 309. 
Pirae'us, the, 260, 261; 269; 295; 532. 
Pi'sa and Pisa'tans, 160. 
Pisis'tratus and the Pisistratidae, 135; 167; usurpation of Pisistratus, 176- 

179 ; death aud character of, 17S ; family of, driven from Athens, 179 ; 214 ; 327. 
Pit'tacus, one of the Seven Sages, 203, 204. 
Plague, the, at Athens, 2S2. 
Platae'a and the Plataeans, 221 ; 236, 243; battle of Plataea, 253-256 ; results 

of, 256, 257, 258 ; 276; attack on, by Thebans, 277, 295 j 300; 309; 518. 
PLATO, the philosopher, 195 ; 199; 350; 356, 390. Life and works of, 456; 460- 

462. 

PLATO, the comic poet — Tomb of Themistocles, 261 ; Aristophanes, 330. 

PLINY.— Story of Panhasius and Zeuxis, 304; 469. 

PLUMPTRE, E. H., D.D.— Personal temperament of ^Eschylus, 310. 

PLUTARCH— Songs of the Spartans, 157; Solon's efforts to recover Salamis, 172; 
Incident of Aristides's banishment, 231 ; Artemisium, 242 ; Lysander and Phil'o- 
cles, 296 ; 387 ; 392. 

Pluto, 20 ; 25. 

Pnyx, the, 372. 

Polyb'ius, 392. Life and works of, 466. 

Pol'ybus, King of Corinth, 315. 

Polycle'tus, a sculptor, 362. 

Polyc'ra-tes, despot of Samos, 201 ; 205. 

Polydec'tes, a Spartan king, 153. 

Polydec'tes, King of Seri'phus, 301. 

Polydo'rus, a Rhodian sculptor, 471. 

Polygno'tus, of Thasos, 363, 364. 

POLYZO'IS.— War song, 500. 

POPE, ALEXANDER. -The Pierian spring, 2; Tribute to Homer, 137: Descrip- 
tion of Pindar, 305 ; Aristotle, 459. 
Posei'don. (See Neptune.) 
Potidae'a, revolt of, 274. 

Praxiteles, an Athenian sculptor, 149; 214; 409. 
Priam. King of Troy, S6; 101; 111. 
Prie'ne, in Caria, 203. 



550 INDEX. 

PRIOR, MATTHEW— Description of Pindar, 303. 

Prod'icus, the Sophist, 325 ; 350. 

Prometheus. Legend of, 37 ; 43 ; 45, 40, 47, 48 ; 63 ; Hesiod's tale of, 190 ; 365 ; 

459. 
Prometheus Bound, the, 45; 47; 311; 364. 
Propon tic Sea, 346. 
Propylse'a, at Athens, 369. 
Pros'erpine, daughter of Ceres, 29 ; 208. 
Protag'oras, the Sophist, 350. 
Pro'teus (or te-us), a sea-deity, 64. 
Protog'enes, a Rhodiau painter, 473. 
Ptol'emy Cerau'nus, of Macedon, 438. 

Ptol'emy Pliiladelphus, King of Egypt, 417; 435, 436, 437. 
Ptol'emy So'ter, Alexander's general, 417 ; 419 ; 434 ; 435. 
Pyd'na, in Macedonia. Battle of, 445. 
Py'lus, in Messenia, 2S7. 
Pyr'rha, wife of Deucalion, 49; 51; 75. 
Pyr'rhus, a son of Achilles, 111. 
Pyr'rhus, King of Epirus, 437 ; war of, with Macedon, 43S ; with Sparta, 438, 439, 

440 ; death of, 441, 442. 
Pythag'oras, the philosopher, 205 ; doctrines of, etc., 205-20S ; 309. 
Pythag'oras, a painter, 360. 
Pyth'ia, priestess of Apollo, 7. 
Pythian games, 7; 145; 147; 
Py'thon, 147; Apollo's conflict with, 14S, 149. 
Py'thon, an orator of Macedon, 400. 

Quintil'ian, the historian, 427; 452. 

Phadaman'thus, son of Jupiter and Europa, 65. 

Phapsodists, the, 53 ; 130. 

Phe a, daughter of Coelus and Terra (Heaven and Earth), 20. 

Elie'gium, in Magna Grcecia, 360. 

RHl'GAS, CONSTANTINE, 49S. War song, 499. 

Phodes, island of, 15; 203; 453; sculptures of, 470 ; 473,474; 502. 

Phoe'cus, a sculptor, 216. 

Poger, King of Sicily, 483. 

Pome and the Pomans, 152; called into Sicily, and become masters of the isl- 
and, 391, 392; defeat of, at Canine, and victory of, at Cynocephalse, 443 ; become 
masters of Greece and Macedon, 443-447; their administration of Greece, 479-4S2. 

RTJSKIN, JOHN.— The " Clouds " of Aristophanes, 334. 

Sacred War, the, 397, 398 ; 400. 

Sages, the Seven, 203, 204. 

Sal'amis, island .of, 15; 134; 171,172; 178; naval battle at, 243-252; 25S; 262; 

309; 462; 502. 
Saler'no, bay of, in Italy, 215. 
Saloni'ca, once Thessaloni'ca, 509. 

Sa'mos, island of, 205 ; 212; 216; 293,294; 314; 337; 403; 521. 
SAP'PHO (saffo), a poetess, 14. Life, writings, and characterization of, 199-201; 

304. 
Sar'dis, in Asia Minor, 220 ; 233; 25S; 375; 379: 409. 
Saron'ic Gulf (Thermaic), 10; 12; 15; 109; 242; 250; 398. 
Sarpe'don, a Trojan hero, SS. 
Sat'urn. (See Chro'nos.) 
Sa'tyrs, the, 31 ; 144 ; 307. 
Scae'an Gates, the, of Troy, 101. 
Scaman'der, river in Asia Minor, 83 ; 99 ; 139. 



INDEX. 551 

Scaptes'y-le, In Thrace, 342. 

SCHILLER.— The building of Thebes, 7; the poet's lament, 32 ; wailing of the 
Trojan women, 107; Damon and Pythias— The Hostage, 3SS; a visit to Archi- 
medes, 393. 
SCHLEGEL, A. W., von.— Character of the Agamemnon, 311. 
Scillus, iuE'lis, 465. 
Sci'o, island of.— Massacre at, 509. 
Sco'pas, the sculptor, 214; 4GS, 409. 
Sculpture — Before the Persian wars, 216-218; from Persian to close of Pelopon- 

nesian wars, 360-3(33 ; subsequent to Peloponnesiau wars, 46S-472. 
Scyl'lis, a sculptor, 216. 
Scy'ros, islaud of, 372. 

Seleu'cus, Alexander's general, 435; the Seleucidse, 435. 
Seli'nus.— Ruins of temples at, 215. 
Seneca, Roman philosopher, 364. 
Seri'phus, island of, 301. 
Seven Chiefs against Thebes, the, 59. 
SEWELL, WILLIAM.— Anecdote of Chrys'ostom, 331. 
SHELLEY, PERCY BYSSHE.-The sufferings of Prometheus, 47; an image of 

Athens, 475 j a prophetic vision of the Greek Revolution, 502. 
Shield of Hercules, the, 1SS. 
Sicilian Expedition, the, 291, 292. 
Sicily, island of. -Colonies in, 182; 1S7; invasion of, by Carthaginians, 1S6; by the 

Athenians, 291 ; 326 ; affairs in the colonies under Hiero, Dionysius, etc., 3S4-396- 

3S7; the Romans conquer, 391 ; 449. 

Si'cy-on and Sicy-o'nians (sish'i-on), 12 ; 160; 167; 169; 298; sculpture of 470- 
painting of, 472. ' 

Sile'nus, a demi-god, 462. The nurse, preceptor, and attendant of Bacchus, to 

whom Socrates was wont to compare himself. 
SIM'MIAS.— Tribute to Sophocles, 321. 
Sim'o-is, a river of Troas, S7. 
Simon ides of Amorgos, 195. 
SIMON'IDES OP CEOS. -Life and writings of, 299-302; 303 ; 304; 3S5. Extracts 

from: Epitaphs on the fallen at Thermopylae, 240; battle of Eurym'edon 203- 

Lameutation of Dan'ae, 301. 
Slavonians, the — Influences of, 4S2. 
SMITH, WILLIAM, LL.D.— Socrates, 35S. Aristotle, 461. 
SOCRATES, 175; 291; 325; attack upon, by Aristophanes, 331-334- 344: 350 Life 

and Works of, 351-359; 456, 457; 461; 465. Extracts from: His Defence, 353. 

Views of a Future State, 356. ' 

Solon, the Athenian law-giver.-Life and legislation of, 171-175; capture of Sala- 
mis by, 1,1, 1,2; his integrity, 173; protests against acts of Pisistratus, 177 17S- 

EKE 7 £? a J? *T*5 ° f ' 17 " ; - ?-" ; Classed as onc of the Se ™' Sages, 203;' 

J!?' £ ;,w; m T 1: RidiCn,e tG Whicb his iute ^y «Posed him 

lid. intimate of his own character and services 176 

Sophists, the, 331; 349; 351; 452. ' 

SOPH'OCLES 310. Life and works of, 314-321; 323; 325; 44S; 450. Extracts 
from: The taking of an oath, 60. Chariut-race of Orestes, 146. The (Edipus 
Tyrannus, 315-319. * 

SOUTIIEY, ROBERT.-The battle of Platen, 257 

SP ^ a i?" d th \ S P artans ' 13 = "5; Sparta is assigned to sons of Aristode- 
mus 12, ; early history of, 153-161; education and patriotism of, 155, 156- their 

^i y 9? uc lr s ;5o 15T; - c ?r s ! sby ' i59 - i6i; i65; i6? ; **•> ^.-t^EE 

1S5; 195; 203;. 220; reject the demands of Darius, but refuse to help Athens it 
Marathon, 221; efforts of, to unite states against Persia, 236; n battl fof The" 

2^ Py Jf%Sttfi^ anieUta a " d epUaphs to ' 239 - 241; iu battle of Salami, 
243, of Plataea, 253-266; on coasts of Asia Minor, 260, 261; loses command in 

war against Persia, 264; earthquake at Sparta, and revolt of the Helots, 265-267; 



552 INDEX. 

accepts aid from Athens, 267; alliance of, with Athens, renounced, and war be- 
gun, 269 ; defeats Athens at Tanagra, and is defeated, ^69 ; truce of, with Athens, 
269; begins Peloponnesian war, 274-2S9; concludes the peace of Nicias, 290; war 
of, with Argives, and victory at Mautinea, 290 ; aids Syracuse against Athens, 
292 ; successes of, against Athens, 292-295; occupies Athens, and withdraws from 
Attica, 296, 297; 375; supremacy of Sparta, 37S-3S1; her defeat and humiliation 
by Thebes, 3S1-3S3 ; engages in the Sacred War, 397 ; revolt of, against Macedon, 
420; war with Pyrrhus, 438-441 ; with Antigonus, 442 ; 465; 4S7, 4S8. 

Spor'a-des, the (islands), 15. 

Sta-gi'ra, in Macedonia, 459. 

Stati'ra, daughter of Darius, 416. 

STEPHENS, JOHN L— A visit to Missolonghi, 51G. 

Stesieh'orus, the poet, 196. 

STORY, WILLIAM W.-Chersiphron, and the Temple of Diana, 213. 

Stroph'a-des, the (islands), 17. 

Stry'mon, the river, 39S ; 425. 

Styx, 121 ; 192; 357. A celebrated torrent in Arcadia— now called "Black water" 
from the dark color of the rocks over which it flows— from which the fabulous 
river of the same name probably originated. 

Su'da, in Achaia, 501. 

Susa, capital of Persia, 235 ; 245 ; 252 ; 412. 

Susa'rion, a comic poet, 327. 

Syb'aris, in Italy, 1S4 ; destroyed by Crotona, 185 ; 337. 

Sylla, a Roman general, 479. 

SYMONDS, JOHN ADDINGTON.— The "Theogony" of Hesiod, 192; Archilo- 
chus, 194; the ladies of Lesbos, 199; Sappho and her poems, 199; the era of 
Athenian greatness, 298 ; Pindar, 303-305 ; Euripides, 322; Menauder,450. 

Syracuse, iu Sicily Founded by Corinthians, 1S3 ; progress of, under Gilon, and 

war with Carthage, 1S6, 187 ; destroys the Athenian expedition, 291-302 ; 327 ; 
affairs of, under Hiero and succeeding rulers, 3S1-396. 

Syrts, two gulfs in Africa, 418. 

TALPOURD, THOMAS NOON. — Unity of the Iliad, 136; Sophocles, 319; the 

glory of Athens, 374. 
Tan'agra, in Boeothi, battle of, 269. 
Tan talus, the story of, 61-63. 
Taren'tura, in Italy, 1S4, 1S5. 
Tar'tarus, the place of punishment, 47; 356, 357. 
Ta-yg'etus, mountain-range of, 13 ; 196 ; 236 ; 265. 
TAYLOR, BAYARD.— Legend of Hylas, S3-86. 
Te'gea, in Arcadia, 161; 255. 
Teg'y-ra, battle at, 382. 
Tem'enus, of the Heraclidas, 127. 
Tem'pe, Vale of, 3. 
Ten'edos, island of, 104, 105; 107. 

TENNENT, EMERSON Turkish oppression in Greece, 493. 

Ten Thousand Greeks, retreat of, 375-378 ; 405. 

Te'os, iu Ionia, 201. 

TERPAN'DER, the poet, 157 ; Spartan valor and music, 158. 

Te'thys, wife of Ocean, 418. 

Tha'is, an Athenian beauty, 413^415. 

Tha'les, one of the Seven Sages, 203; philosophy of, 204 ; 344. 

Theag'enes, despot of Megara, 168 ; 171. 

The'foe, a city of Mysia, 91. 

Thebes, city of, 7, 8; 75; Thebans at Thermopylae, 237, 238; 276; attack of Thebans 

on Platsea, 277; sympathy of, with Athens, 297; 299; 302; 315, 316; 31S, 319; 

seizure of, by the Spartans, 3S0 ; rise and fall of Thebes, 3S1-3S3 ; 397; 399, 400; 

402; defeat of, at Charonea, 407 ; 409; 428; 4S3; 490. 



index. 553 

The'mis, goddess of justice, or law, 51 ; 54. 

Themis'to-cles, Athenian general and statesman, 143 j at Marathon, 222; rise of 
wiSfJK ; 'f aU >\ 231; *«~tar and acts of, 232; at Artemisinm, 242, and a 

mesToI^l! l£«£S£ W "* ^ * "* ™ 5 "" — rt " *** ^ 

TIIEOC'RITUS.-Ptolemy Philadelphia, 436. 

Theodo'rus, the sculptor, 216. 

THEOG'NIS, poet of Megara.— The Revolutions in Meeara, 168 169 

Thcog'ony, the, 21 ; 18S ; 190-192. . 

The'ra, island of, 276. 

Therma'ic Gulf (Saronic), 2. 

^Zfw'Xm?^' 236; batt,eat ' 236 - 211 '"^ ™; »« «•• «. 

The'ron, ruler of Agrigentum, 184. 
Thersrtes, a Greek warrior, S8; 117. 

The'seus (or se-us), first king of Athens, 74; 76; temple to, at Athens, 142- le- 
gends of, 223; temple of, 364; 372,373; 484. ' ' 
Thes'pise and the Thespians, 236; 243. 
Thes'pis, 307. 
Thes'salus, son of Pisistratns, 179. 

Tk s^xf^srsrA w ' 15; 75; ,26; i35; Ki > ■»•■■"' * 

mS™V^r a Jt a ' deity » 101; " Thetis ' son" (Achilles), 106; 363. 

^ LW ^L, CONNOP, D.D.-The Trojan war, 110. Want of political union 
among the Greeks, 151. Character of an ochlocracy, 162. Effects of the fall of 
oligarchy, 165. Writings of Theognis, 16S. The rule of Pisistratns, 17S Reforms 
of Chsthenes, 180. The « Theogony » of Hesiod, 192. Progress of Sculpture 2V 

w ri S Tn'f 2 / 2G t P fi cIes > 284 - Pindar, 302. The Greeks in he Sa'cred 

War, 398. Last struggles of Greece, 446. 

TH Sf T^^nTS A P° U ****«* W9. Sparta, 153. Tribute to Solon, 
175. leachings of Pythagoras, 206. Architecture, 212. Aristides 231 Cimon 
262. Socrates, 352. Architecture, 367. Retreat of the Ten Thousand 376 Pel 
lop.dasandEpaminondas,3S2. The Dying Gladiator, 471. TheLloc'o^u 471 
The painting by Protog'enes at Rhodes, 474. ' 

Thrace, 221; 235; 264; 276; 398; 408. 

Thrasybu'lus, an Athenian patriot, 297 ; 495. 

Thrasybulus, despot of Syracuse, 3S6. 

TU %7 Y ^S'li\ e HS tOT SL 274; 2S1 ' 282; 284; 2S6 > 2S7 ' Li ^ and Works of, 
OrVti m oflerlclJs 277 A^ "S : ^^ ° f PerideS to ^ 275 « Fuue ™ 
Th«^; in iS^S? ; "2 MS 611 " 11 *** * * I1 ~< "* 
Tigra'nes, 258. 

Tire'sias (shi-as) priest and prophet. (See (Edipus Tyrannies.) 

lir'yns, in Argolis, 12; 211. 

Tissapher'nes, Persian satrap, 293. 

Ti'tans, the, 20-22; 192; 211. 

Tit'y-us, punishment of, 63. 

Tragedy. -At Athens, 308-326; decline of, 44S. 

Trajan, the Roman emperor, 480. 

Tripolit'za, modern capital of Arcadia, 502. 

Tr u!7? ' 1( V, 51 ' £ sea - deit y> half fish in form, the sou and trumpeter of NenW 
He blew through a shell to rouse or to allay the sea. of Neptune. 

^^^TL^*™™* *'^™'* consequences of, 120 ; 135; 163. 
T °SS^SST Sympathy With Greece ' ««■ Character of Otho, 528. 

24 



554 INDEX. 

Turks, the, 370; invade Greece, 4S4; contests of, with the Venetians, 4S6; siege 
and capture of Corinth hy, 4SS; final conquest of Greece, 493, 494; 497; Greek 
revolution against, 500-625 ; compelled to evacuate Greece, 525; 527; 530; 531. 

Tydi des, a patronymic of Diomed, 91 ; 137 ; ISO. 

TYLER, PROF. W. S.— The divine mission of Socrates, 359. 

TYMN^E'US.— Spartan patriotic virtue, 156. 

Tyn'darus, King of Sparta, SO. 

Tyrant, or despot. — Definition of, 106. 

Tyrants, the Thirty, 296, 297. The Ten Tyrants, 297 ; 351 ; 426. 

Tyre, city of, 410. 

TYRT^E'US.— Spartan war-song, 160. 

Ulys'ses, subject of the Odyssey, 17; 60, 61 ; S6; goes to Troy, 87; rebukes Ther- 
sites, SS; 94; advises construction of the wooden horse, 104; 106; wanderings 
of, 111; 119; character of, 120 ; raft of, described, 123 ; 135. 

Ulys'ses, a Greek general, 502. 

U'ranus, or Heaven, 20. 

Venetians, the, 370; contests of, with the Turks, 486; capture the Peloponnesus 
aud Athens, 4S6; evacuate Athens, 4S7; abandon Greece, 493 ; 531. 

Venus, or Aphrodi'te, goddess of love, 8; 15; 20; 37; 90; appears to Helen, 
114; 143 ; 309 ; 469 ; statue of, 469 ; painting of, rising from the sea, 473.' 

Vesta, 25 ; 59. 

VIRGIL.— Landing of ^Eneas, 17. The taking of an oath, CO. The fate of Troy, 
104-107. The Cumsean Cave, 1S3. The Eleusinian Mvsteries, 209. 

Vo'lo, gulf of, 530. 

Vulcan, god of fire. 15; 25, 26; 37; 41 ; 44; 95, 96 ; 99 ; 365. 

WARBTJRTON, ELIOT B. G.— The sortie at Missolonghi, 515. 

Was])s, the, 25S, 259. 

WEBSTER, DANIEL.— Appeal of, for sympathy with the Greeks, 511. 

WEYMAN, C. S.— Changes in statuary, 468. 

WILLIS, N. P.— Parrhasius and his captive, 365. 

WLNTHROP, ROBERT C Visit of Cicero to tomb of Archimedes, 393-396. 

WOOLNER, THOMAS.— Venus risen from the sea, 16. 

WORDSWORTH, WILLIAM.— Fancies of the Greek mind, 27. The joy of the 

Greeks at the Isthmian games, 445. 
Works and Days, the, 37 ; 56 ; 1S8 ; 192. 

Xan'thus, or the river Scamander, 141. 

Xenopli'anes, the philosopher, 205. 

Xen'ophon, the historian. — Leads the retreat of the Ten Thousand, 376-3 7S. 
Life and works of, 464-467. 

Xerxes, King of Persia, 186 ; prepares to invade Greece, and reviews his troops at 
Abydos, 233 ; stories of, 234 ; bridges and crosses the Hellespont, 235 ; defeats 
the Spartans at Thermopylae, 236-239 ; is defeated at Salamis : his flight, 243, 244, 
245; 247; 249,250; 253; 25S ; death of, 260 ; 262; 271; 412; 444. 

Xu'thus, son of Helen, 76. 

YOUNG, EDWARD.— The persuasive Nestor, 95. 

Ypsilan'ti, Alexander.— The first to proclaim the liberty of Greece, 501. 

Zacyn'thus, island of, 17. 

Ze'no, a philosopher of Elea, 205; 352. 

Ze'no, the Stoic philosopher, of Citium.— Life and works of, 463. 

Zeux'is, the painter.— Anecdote of, 364 ; 472. 

THE END. 



MOSAICS OF BIBLE HISTORY. 



MOSAICS OF BIBLE HISTORY. The Bible Record, 
with Illustrative Poetic and Prose Selections from 
standard Literature. By Marcius Willson and 
Robert Pierpoxt Willso*. In Two Volumes. 
12mo, Cloth, $3 00. 

Their work presents in brief the best thought, and scholarship, and sen- 
timent, on each of the topics treated in it. It deals with the Scriptures as 
a sacred literature, and in a truly literary spirit and way. The work is ad 
mirably adapted to the wants of students and teachers, and will be a valua- 
ble addition to the literary and religious resources of intelligent Christian 
households.— Christian at Work,N.Y. 

The selections have been judiciously made, and are introduced into the 
narrative with telling effect.— Boston Globe. 

^ The plan pursued is a new one, and the work is adapted to interest and 
instruct any reader, and particularly the young.— Boston Journal 

The historical connection of the successive books of the Old and New 
Testaments is pointed out; the circumstances under which they were writ 
ten are described, and the leading characteristics concisely designated in the 
spirit of the prevalent orthodoxy and with a fulness commensurate with the 
limits of two snug volumes. The prominent feature of the work is the in 
traduction of numerous well-selected extracts from modern authors espe- 
cially the poets, who have penned immortal verse upon the great t'hemes 
which distinguish the Jewish and Christian religions.— N. Y. Times 

Many of the selections are of great power and beauty, and will' deepen 
the interest felt in the Bible, and serve to fasten the facts and events of 
which they treat in the memory and heart.— The Churchman, N Y 

It will be read with interest by older people, and it furnishes an admira- 
ble method not only for instructing youth in Scripture narrative, but also 
for familiarizing them with much that is valuable in prose and poetry from 
the better authors of different eras of hxstovy.- Saturday Evening Gazette 
Boston. d ' 

Marcius and Kobert Pierpont Willson have designed and executed the 
Mosaics of Bible history by embellishing the Sacred Record with poetic and 
prose gems selected from choice literature. They take a Bible subject and 
after some appropriate comments of their own, they quote from famous 
travellers, poets, preachers, and men of science some memorable words 
which bring the ancient scene or occurrence more vividly before the read- 
er's mind. The citations, especially from the poets, are extremely good 
and the whole effect is illuminating and elevating. The authors seem to 
be free from sectarian prejudices, and have prepared a work which should 
be acceptable to persons of every religious denomination.— N. Y. Journal 
of Commerce. 

A book of surpassing interest. * * * The idea of the compilers is to give 
illustration, by poetic and prose selections from standard literature, in ref- 



Mosaics of Bible History. 



erence to the chief events in the Biblical records. So happily and compre- 
hensively has this been done that it might almost seem as 'though many 
poets had sought their muse with a premonition that some day their inspi- 
rations might be made use of precisely in this manner.— Phila. Item. 

The editors have made large and admirable selections from the best writ- 
ers in prose and verse, so that their work presents in brief the best thought 
and scholarship and sentiment on each of the topics treated in H.—&Y. 
Star. 

This is at once the most novel, attractive, and interesting contribution to 
sacred literature that has come from the press in a long time. Its style is 
graphic, and it will appeal to tastes that do not generally take kindly to es- 
says of this sort. — Rochester Herald, 

It is a most ingenious commonplace book of what may be found in Eng- 
lish literature bearing upon the characters and incidents of Scripture.— 
Workman, Pittsburgh, Pa. 

The work of years in gathering, collating, and selecting the thoughts of 
many of the wisest and best of men is concentrated in these two volumes. 
— Vinelancl Independent, N. J. 

These volumes not only afford valuable aids to the study of the Script- 
ures, but they also stimulate interest in the Scripture story. To Sunday- 
school teachers and scholars also they will especially commend themselves, 
while by the religious world in general they cannot fail to be warmly wel- 
comed.— -Hartford Courant. 

An intelligent compilation of the best Christian criticism of the Bible to 
be found in the English language.— Portland Advertiser. 

The plan is well carried out, and the selections judiciously made.— Chi- 
cago Interior. 

This book has an original flavor, and is in every way deserving of the fa- 
vor of lovers of religious literature. — Utica Observer. 

The writings of the most eminent Bible critics have been laid under con- 
tribution to furnish material for these variegated compositions, and suita- 
ble portions of the world's best literature are gathered in clusters around 
the scenes and incidents of Sacred History.— Pulpit Treasury, N. Y. 

Unique in the plan of Bible study, yet a very effective one in showing 
the beauties of sacred literature, ft will prove a valuable help to the bet- 
ter understanding of the Scriptur es.4-Philadelphia Methodist. 

Students and teachers of the Bible will find the book valuable both be- 
cause it preserves the historical conn|ctions of Biblical history, and because 
it turns the light from all the directions upon the Sacred Word.— Spring- 
field Union, Mass. 

The best contribution to the general literature concerning the Bible that 
has appeared for years.— Paper- Wotld, Holyoke, Mass. 



Published by HARPER ffc BROTHERS, New York. 

Harper & Brothers wiU send tAe above work by mail, postage prepaid, to 
any part of the United States, on receipt of the price. 



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